Power Outage at Great Adventure

A power outage, allegedly caused by a faulty transformer, pretty much shut down Six Flags Great Adventure in the early afternoon on Sunday September 14. My companion and I had gotten off Kingda Ka and moved on to Zumanjaro, which he had never ridden, and which experienced multiple delays while we waited to ride it although there was not a long line. Shortly after 2pm we were informed that there was a power outage. We waited a bit longer and saw a fire engine drive by, and when it became clear that power was not going to be restored any time soon, we gave up. We were stuck at the park b/c we had come on a NJ Transit bus not scheduled to leave until 7:30pm. During this time all of the major rides remained closed, as did some of the restaurants. Most of the restrooms were plunged into total darkness. The only rides operating were Slingshot, Twister and the parachute ride, presumably on a different grid. Twister was the most popular ride in the park! Anyway, we didn't get to ride anything due to the long queues; Kingda Ka was our only ride in 10 hours at the park. (The bus didn't leave until 8:30pm due to a massive traffic jam as not only was there a mass exodus from the park but according to NJ Transit officials, there was a traffic accident involving fatalities and helicopters on the highway.)

Wow, I guess SFGAdv really does suck.

It has been known to happen at a lot of parks. This is not one of the reasons I consider this park to suck so bad. :)

I would like to ask though, did the park offer a ticket to return another day?

Given some of the misguided hostility I'd seen directed at the park, for a second I mis-read the thread title:

"Power OUTRAGE at Great Adventure"

Here's a "news" story. Yours truly can be seen in the still photo before starting play, and at about 1:10 and 1:34 in the video. Next-to-last row, far right seat on Bizarro. My first ever evac! Now if I could get a rollback on Ka, I can die happy...

http://7online.com/news/power-outage-at-great-adventure-theme-park-in-nj/308240/

Oh, a celebrity!

I gotta say something first, though.
Ya know, as Great an Adventure as that was, "news" stories like that make me sick. "Stranded" passengers are portrayed as brave and heroic, when truthfully all they had to do was walk down 5 stairs on a catwalk that is probably safer than these people's front porch stairs at home. Dads and daughters are interviewed as if there was some dire, life threatening emergency that kept them separated for hours. Disgruntled customers are seen as mistreated when they attempt to get their money back when in reality the park compensated everyone with a return ticket good anytime, next season, even. Sheesh. I blame the news stations for this, mind you, not the park. Always trying to sensationalize a story. There oughtta be a law. Ok, end of rant.

And I'm glad you got the thrill of an evac, Mike, even though it looks like your chair didn't make it to the incline of the lift. :)
And always remember something for the future- Where Bobbie Goes, Trouble Follows!

Mike Gallagher said:

Here's a "news" story. Yours truly can be seen in the still photo before starting play, and at about 1:10 and 1:34 in the video. Next-to-last row, far right seat on Bizarro. My first ever evac!

Congrats. You've just given Bobbie the motivation to sue GAdv for a lack of screen time.

Travis asked whether the park offered anyone a ticket to come back on another day. Not to my knowledge. I think that this falls into the category of inclement weather or acts of God or whatever. I'm glad I used my season pass to get a total stranger into the park for free (last bring a friend for free day of the season), as that was at least one guy who didn't have to pay for admission to a park where things had come to a standstill. What baffles me is the number of people who remained at the park when the prospects of things returning to normal looked very dim indeed. When they shut the gate to Golden Kingdom, that looked pretty definitive.

I knew that Mike was going to the park and was hoping to run into him but didn't. Anyway, he had an experience that doesn't happen every day and if he enjoyed the novelty I'm glad.

Oh yeah, where I go, trouble follows. Once when I was in the loading station with Mike, a Nitro train got stuck on the lift hill and it was all my fault!

When the train first stopped...before I knew it was a park-wide thing...my first thought was: "Geez, Bizarro is the most reliable, dependable ride in the park...and IT gets stuck?!"

RCMAC, your post simply validates my decision to put "news" in quote marks. It really was nothing, no one was in any danger (except maybe the folks who couldn't use the bathrooms), and yeah, being evac'd from the location we were was certainly not a big deal. But it was a unique experience for me, and I'll savor it.

And Bobbie, since I was there too, on both occasions, maybe it's NOT you ;)

Bobbie1951 said:

Travis asked whether the park offered anyone a ticket to come back on another day. Not to my knowledge. I think that this falls into the category of inclement weather or acts of God or whatever.

The question was answered at the end of the news story and then repeated in RCMAC's following post about it. Customers were given a ticket to return this season or next season.

As much as I dislike Six Flags Great Adventure for reasons that have nothing to do with this topic, I had no doubt that they gave out return tickets in this situation.

I have experienced a power outage at both Hersheypark and Six Flags Ohio. Hersheypark gave us return tickets and the park resumed operations that afternoon. The young girl at the window at Six Flags Ohio was very rude, and offer no return tickets, plus the park did not open back up.

The warm fuzzies that I got from Hersheypark that day made me excited to return the next season. I never went back to SFO. Poor customer service was only one of many problems that plagued that park.

LostKause said:

The question was answered at the end of the news story and then repeated in RCMAC's following post about it. Customers were given a ticket to return this season or next season.

*IF* they waited in what appeared to be a three-hour-or-so line at Guest Relations.

I was with a friend I'd brought in for free. They appeared to be asking for receipts at the window in order to get the free pass for future admission. I doubted they'd give Gina one since she didn't pay and had no receipt, and I didn't need one, so we split. Gina's main thing was to get her first ride on Zumanjaro, so although we were disappointed we didn't get on more rides, at least she got that. And we hadn't seen one another in a good while, so that part of it was cool.