Riders stuck on roller coaster in storm at Canada's Wonderland

Posted Wednesday, May 25, 2022 7:23 PM | Contributed by Jeff

Visitors at Canada's Wonderland were caught amid a powerful storm Saturday, leaving some trapped on roller coaster rides for up to 30 minutes while others were scrambling to find shelter at the amusement park in Vaughan, Ont.

Read more from The CBC.

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Jeff

Wednesday, May 25, 2022 7:28 PM
Jeff's avatar

How do you release restraints out of the station on a B&M hyper? Do you need a battery? I just don't understand how a train in the catwalk outside of the station isn't quickly evacuated in this situation for a half-hour.


Jeff - Editor - CoasterBuzz.com - My Blog

+2

Touchdown

Wednesday, May 25, 2022 7:34 PM

How does the park not call a storm close far enough out to cycle to empty the trains very poor form.


2022 Trips: WDW, Sea World San Diego & Orlando, CP, KI, BGW, Bay Beach, Canobie Lake, Universal Orlando

+2

RideMan

Wednesday, May 25, 2022 9:00 PM

I thought B&M's restraint releases were all mechanical, as they should be, although they require a tool, which is completely improper.

How fast did the storm come up? Somewhere I have a potato-cam video of a storm at Cedar Point where two trainloads of riders were stranded on Maverick, and would have got just as wet if they had been in the station. I had just ridden, so I was standing on the exit stile when it all broke loose. The two trains in the station were unloaded, but could not be dispatched, so the remaining trains were stuck on the back brake, and the unloading process with the battery box would have taken longer than the storm lasted. I was surprised, though, that they couldn't have moved the trains in the station forward so as to get the other two unloaded.

I'll hunt for that video...

--Dave Althoff, Jr.


    /X\        _      *** Respect rides. They do not respect you. ***
/XXX\ /X\ /X\_ _ /X\__ _ _ _____
/XXXXX\ /XXX\ /XXXX\_ /X\ /XXXXX\ /X\ /X\ /XXXXX
_/XXXXXXX\__/XXXXX\/XXXXXXXX\_/XXX\_/XXXXXXX\__/XXX\_/XXX\_/\_/XXXXXX

+0

Danimales

Thursday, May 26, 2022 5:09 PM

Rideman I was at CP one day where a storm came rolling in quickly and there was a train sitting on the brake run of Maverick. Some of the heaviest rain I've seen and those people were stuck there just getting absolutely drenched!

As for B&M hypers, last year I was sitting on the just outside of the station when Diamondback broke down. Ride ops had to come out and manually release restrains car by car, unloading passengers onto the catwalk one at a time. It was a very slow process.

+0

ApolloAndy

Thursday, May 26, 2022 6:40 PM
ApolloAndy's avatar

Did you guys know that Jeff had to walk down S:RoS SFA's lift once?


Hobbes: "What's the point of attaching a number to everything you do?"
Calvin: "If your numbers go up, it means you're having more fun."

+11

Jeff

Thursday, May 26, 2022 6:44 PM
Jeff's avatar

I'm so glad someone remembers.


Jeff - Editor - CoasterBuzz.com - My Blog

+6

RCMAC

Thursday, May 26, 2022 7:21 PM

*sigh*
yeeeeeesss…

+0

ApolloAndy

Thursday, May 26, 2022 11:40 PM
ApolloAndy's avatar

On Monday, I will have a moment of silence for our fallen troops and another for Jeff's long walk to freedom.

Last edited by ApolloAndy, Thursday, May 26, 2022 11:40 PM

Hobbes: "What's the point of attaching a number to everything you do?"
Calvin: "If your numbers go up, it means you're having more fun."

+0

Jeff

Friday, May 27, 2022 2:26 AM
Jeff's avatar

You're making it weird now.


Jeff - Editor - CoasterBuzz.com - My Blog

+1

Raven-Phile

Friday, May 27, 2022 1:34 PM
Raven-Phile's avatar

Leave it to Andy

Making things a little weird

SROS lift chain go SNAP

+3

Vater

Friday, May 27, 2022 1:38 PM
Vater's avatar

I read the last line with 8 syllables. Never in my life have I read that coaster acronym as a one syllable word.

+2

Raven-Phile

Friday, May 27, 2022 1:53 PM
Raven-Phile's avatar

It was the only way to make it work

I can remove the S, if neccessary

+0

Schwarzkopf76

Friday, May 27, 2022 2:20 PM
Schwarzkopf76's avatar

This reminds me of the coasters I've ridden in the rain, and once The Beast in the snow. But the bad one was Vortex at KI in the front seat during a freezing rain (the same day as the snow, 1989). That hurt. Why did they still send trains in that kind of rain? More importantly, why did I pick the FRONT seat? Spent the ride trying to protect my face, ouch.

Last edited by Schwarzkopf76, Tuesday, May 31, 2022 5:27 PM
+0

Le Monster

Saturday, May 28, 2022 4:32 AM

Curious how this happened. I live in the area and about a half hour before the storm got 8 amber alerts saying to take cover. Amber alerts are normally to get eyes out for a missing child, but this is the first one we've ever had for weather. Park likely has someone monitoring a weather radar and they definitely would have gotten the loud alerts on their phones.

+0

RideMan

Saturday, May 28, 2022 5:26 AM

I found the video I talked about earlier. Fair warning, it looks and sounds like it was shot with a potato, and it's sized for viewing on a phone that was released in 2009 and discontinued in 2010 (and that I stopped using in 2020). I even whipped up a web page for it from which you can download the video for easier (?) viewing.

I dunno, can I embed it here somehow? Let's see if this works...

That storm came up VERY fast. It was a hot, humid day, June 14, 2015, that was threatening a storm all day long that never came. Then it came. So far as I know, this incident didn't make the news.

--Dave Althoff, Jr.


    /X\        _      *** Respect rides. They do not respect you. ***
/XXX\ /X\ /X\_ _ /X\__ _ _ _____
/XXXXX\ /XXX\ /XXXX\_ /X\ /XXXXX\ /X\ /X\ /XXXXX
_/XXXXXXX\__/XXXXX\/XXXXXXXX\_/XXX\_/XXXXXXX\__/XXX\_/XXX\_/\_/XXXXXX

+0

hambone

Saturday, May 28, 2022 2:34 PM
hambone's avatar

Cedar Fair hates dry people.

+10

BrettV

Saturday, May 28, 2022 2:55 PM

That video is why Steel Vengeance won't run on a pleasant sunny day.

+0

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