El Toro at Six Flags Great Adventure shutdown after "partial derailment"

Well, that might be a bummer during my visit next week. Although less of a bummer than getting launched off the second hill.

Is anyone else a little…not surprised at this? Not because it’s Six Flags or anything negative, but simply because the insane force that coaster pulls over each hill? I’m not an engineer, nor do I have a coaster credit list much past one hundred, so I’m no expert. However, the noise Toro makes when it flies over the airtime hills always sounded to me like something that really shouldn’t be happening. Like the upstop wheels were hanging on by a thread because that train wanted to keep traveling upward instead of dropping down into the next section. Plus wood has so much more flex and expansion and contraction, so logically (to me), couldn’t too much added force on the wheels and wood cause the coaster to basically…pop out of alignment?

Follow up report that doesn't really reveal new things: https://www.nj.com/ocean/2021/07/rear-wheels-moved-out-of-position-...finds.html

Since we are playing armchair detective here, it sounds like the left and right "rails" (I don't know the proper term for these prefabricated wood sections) lost their gauge and the last car popped out of position. If I'm correct, this means that the failure was not the car or the rail, but rather the ledger that maintains the distance when there lateral Gs are at play.

https://rcdb.com/3183.htm#p=121625

That sounds like it was probably terrifying if the wheels were out of position for nearly the whole ride! Yikes!

While I am extremely glad no one was hurt, now I’m wondering how bad the damage to the coaster is.

bunky666 said:

Is anyone else a little…not surprised at this? Not because it’s Six Flags or anything negative, but simply because the insane force that coaster pulls over each hill?

It still shouldn't happen. So, yes, to me is just as much of a surprise and a "that's not okay" whether it's a Dragon Wagon or El Toro.

Who is familiar with El Toro? What do the wheel sets on that thing look like? I know the train is trailered; are the wheel sets fixed more or less rigid to the car frame as on a GCI car? Or are they mounted on a moving axle as we see on articulated cars like the non-trailered PTCs? Or are these mounted on independent wheel carrier bearings like the Intamin giga coasters?

--Dave Althoff, Jr.