Cedar Point announces Wicked Twister will close in September

Post video on Friday afternoon. Buy some spray paint and stakes over the weekend. Move park webcams around a little. Let the fun begin with enthusiasts.

ApolloAndy said:

I remember when Hershey did their big puzzle for I think Faernheit? I didn’t especially care for that and that was 13 years ago before I had kids or a mortgage.

But that's the thing; Cedar Point doesn't really seem to get into the deep cryptic stuff. The last time I remember any type of "clues" goes way back to Tony and Tyler on their blog...and that was for Skyhawk. CP likes to be straight forward and let the internet do the puzzling for them. Before Steel Vengeance they literally let a stake be seen in plain sight in the Mean Streak queue that read "RMC". It wasn't exactly a puzzle.

It is fun to speculate/dream of what's to come, though.

I guess you could say the two of you are on opposite ends of the slider??

Chaindog said:

I dunno... she does "turn the page" on Maxair, which hasn't run this year. Just sayin' ; )

So we are getting a Bob Seger themed coaster?

TheMillenniumRider said:

I guess you could say the two of you are on opposite ends of the slider??

Covid-themed "Giant Slider" ride.

Wait.. she turns the page, back and to the left!!!!

Red Garter Rob said:

Wait.. she turns the page, back and to the left!!!!

Exactly! And I think I saw Bigfoot prints in the sand...

Well, I will certainly miss Wicked Twister. While it certainly wasn't my favorite ride there, it was usually a decent thrill with a shortish wait. Standing in line right by the beach could also be nice on a hot day.

My initial reaction is that its probably just going to be scrapped. The ride had to be overhauled after the first season due to the towers swaying too much. Even with the overhaul, I wonder if the towers are just near the end of life.

My second reaction is that the girl reading the anniversary book it open to the page about Mantis. That was certainly a deliberate choice. So why Mantis? It COULD be a clue that they are going to re-paint & re-theme the ride. Perhaps move it in the park & perhaps switch from LIM to the more energy efficient LSM. While this is certainly a possibility, I wouldn't be willing to be much more than a cheese-on-a-stick, that this will happen.

Even if sections of track required replacement for the relocation, they would still save a lot of money reusing a majority of the rest of the ride if moved. Making a few sections of a track would be a minor cost compared to a brand new ride. The cost of the train, support columns, LIM's and control system, etc...

It's a pretty 'easy' ride to relocate, in terms of disassembly time as far as track/support pieces go and the relocation logistics required (truck loads required to move things around, the new footings to be prepped/poured at the new park, etc...). Again, compared to say something like BKF/Dominator to Dominion, for example. It's a compact ride with relatively few pieces to move.

Obviously they're going to augment it with Volcano, which they've been secretly storing somewhere.

That's the only way they can justify moving it to Dorney when they already have an impulse coaster.

Bakeman31092 said:

My 11-year-old daughter got to ride this for the first time just last month, and she took this news really hard. Like, sobbing.

Interestingly enough, my 12 year old daughter had the exact same reaction. Being that Wicked Twister was one of those rides you'd have no problem getting on (even on a busy day), it was a must ride for us on every trip. I guess I hadn't put much thought into it, but I wasn't expecting the reaction I got when I told her it was closing.

TheMillenniumRider said:

RideMan said:

I think this is almost entirely about what some other park is going to get next season.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

But Dorney already has an impulse.

You read my mind, although Possessed is down so often and for such long periods of time that I wouldn’t be surprised if they scrapped it and put in WT in hopes of a few more seasons for one of them. Doesn’t make a lot of sense, but many of their decisions regarding Dorney don’t make a lot of sense to me, so…

I've posted this elsewhere, but just as a data point, here's the information placard for the U-shaped Coaster at Victory Kingdom in China. Note the last line.

https://imgur.com/a/2KXiznA

Why would they put that on a placard that the public can see?

That’s big in China.

I’m big in China.

But anyway, SFGAm’s has run for more than 20 years in the same place and Possessed and V2 SFDK are both more than 20 years old with a relocation and a modification.

That is the problem with the placard. Lots of things outlive the expected life span. So if this is on the placard does the ride get shut down and demo'd when the 20 years is up? Or does the park ignore it? If they ignore it, will people continue to ride it even though it is past the date? Or worse, if the park keeps operating it and something bad happens, why did the park keep operating it?

Or maybe the ride simply gets "re-certified" and a new placard boldly announces that it is good for another 20 years.

I remember Ron Toomer saying at Coastermania (1999?) that they really didn't know how long rides might last. Corkscrew at CP is currently, what, 45 years?

Reminds me of this bit from an interview with John Allen:

"We designed a roller coaster with tubular steel tracks in 1936. We designed it, but we never built it. I told Herb Schmeck, 'Well Herb, I haven't found a dwarf or a midget small enough to crawl inside those tubes and find out what's happening in there.'"
(Fun Land USA by Tim Onosko, 1978)

Obviously, we've got tools these days that obviate the dwarf/midget. I trust Cedar Point is using them.