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[2024] Thorpe Park: Hyperia - Mack Hypercoaster

There was two cattlepen queues interweaved into a big mess of slowly moving people, you get your bags searched and put your phone and keys etc into a plastic tray. Just took far longer than necessary, it took us half an hour in total to get into the park, that said, it's a busy day, despite hyperia not being open

Hyperia is firing on all cylinders and has quite consistently been testing on two trains this morning. I am a little surprised at how noisy the lift hill is! Beautiful looking ride and truly heart breaking to not get my chance to ride it this time :(
 
Islander said:
I think it's very unlikely that this is true - Thorpe/Mack almost certainly know when they're likely to be able to reopen, they'll 100% have a date that they're working towards. For them, the closure is in no way indefinite, to the letter of the word's meaning, and never was.
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Thorpe and Mack would have spent a very long time "working towards" the 25th May being Hyperia's 2nd day of public operation.

They'd have believed in February that "they're likely to be able to be open" on the 8th June 2024.

Nobody knows when the ride will reopen. And the decision of when to reopen will be made and announced when circumstances allow, not simply when we reach a certain date and time. That's indefinite. From our POV as customers, and from the park's and manufacturer's POV.

"We're hoping by x" doesn't change that, "we're working towards y" doesn't change that, "we estimate by z" doesn't change that.

"This restaurant will be closed for two weeks for refurbishment" - not an indefinite closure.

"This playground will be closed until further notice" - an indefinite closure

"This tram line is closed until 10/11/24" - not an indefinite closure

"Unfortunately we are currently unable to confirm when Hyperia will re-open" - an indefinite closure.
 
Technically it is operating today, just not accepting riders. Not sure the Sun readers can understand what indefinite is...? "Ooh Tony, are you in yet? Yes Julie, I'm indefinite". 😂

As for safety, the ride is designed to "fail safe" - from anything to the chain/motor breaking, sensors not working, brake failure, etc, etc. Never a hint that it wasn't safe, just that it wasn't RELIABLE. This is also true for the Smiler incident, which was sadly caused by operator error.

They'll be testing every day for a few days yet - test, measure, check, repeat - to make sure the problem doesn't resurface. Not just TP but Mack too.
 
Smiley said:
Technically it is operating today, just not accepting riders. Not sure the Sun readers can understand what indefinite is...? "Ooh Tony, are you in yet? Yes Julie, I'm indefinite". 😂

As for safety, the ride is designed to "fail safe" - from anything to the chain/motor breaking, sensors not working, brake failure, etc, etc. Never a hint that it wasn't safe, just that it wasn't RELIABLE. This is also true for the Smiler incident, which was sadly caused by operator error.

They'll be testing every day for a few days yet - test, measure, check, repeat - to make sure the problem doesn't resurface. Not just TP but Mack too.
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Too much made of the papers headline here. It's the S*n after all. Clickbait headlines to get traffic to their horrible site. Don't give them any clicks. Hopefully they'll be out of business in a few years.

Must people accept it's likely but not definite it's close to reopening. One thing I'm keen to know is what this thing is like in the rain! From memory no one has ride the fastest coaster in British driving train.

Forecast next weekend? Sat: rain Sun: rain 😂
 
I think if we’re not careful we can end up going into straw man territory. I don’t know what everyone’s saying on social media or the Sun’s website, but on here I don’t think anyone’s suggesting that Mack aren’t a good manufacturer.

We know they’re one of the oldest manufacturers of theme park rides (possibly the oldest) and that they’ve got a massive amount of experience. We know they have their own theme park which gives them additional insights into their rides that other manufacturers might not get. We know that German engineering is generally pretty rigorous. We know Mack are one of the premium manufacturers that are used by leading theme parks around the world, and that their rides have a very good safety record.

Theme park safety systems are complex. I’m not going to quote people because then it looks confrontational or like a point scoring exercise, and that’s not what I’m trying to do here. I’m hoping this post contributes to the debate.

Essentially you’re trying to avoid single points of failure. That can include fail safe systems, for example roller coaster brakes require power to open them rather than close them, so if they lose power they fail in the closed position. It can include redundant safety systems. For example if the chain breaks, there’s an anti-roll back system to catch the train. It can include over engineering. For example you have a lot more supports than the ride needs to hold the track up, so if a support breaks, the track is still safe.

Whilst you try to keep single points of failure to a minimum, it isn’t always possible. For example, the coupling between carriages is often a single point of failure, where if it broke, there could be a serious accident. Where you have a single point of failure, it’s particularly important to have other control measures. This can include over engineering that particular part (so you make the coupling much stronger than it needs to be), having a relatively short design life for that part (so the coupling might have to be changed at least every 5 years), you restrict repairs on the part (so if a coupling cracks you replace it rather than welding the crack) and you have a thorough inspection plan for that part.

Modern roller coasters also have more complex control systems, with more sensors and more powerful PLCs that can run more checks and potentially detect abnormalities earlier on.

All of these principles do make riding roller coasters a relatively safe activity. I don’t think anyone on here has disputed any of that. The contention has been on whether or not Hyperia would have benefitted from more testing and whether or not the commissioning process ended up being ‘rushed’.

I don’t think anyone’s suggesting that Hyperia’s a death trap or that they won’t ever ride it. No one’s saying it doesn’t have the safety features most other roller coasters have. And we don’t know exactly what tests they did or didn’t do. There has simply been a suggestion that it might have benefited from more testing, which I think is reasonable. Suggesting that a roller coaster could have benefitted from more testing doesn't mean that you're some kind of hysterical person who walks around wrapped in cotton wool.
 
Like with anything, the more complex the machine, the more chances it has of breaking. The often over sensitivity of some components also doesn't help (the airgates issue).

Suggestions that it wasn't tested enough ignores the role of the manufacturer and ADIPS needing to sign it off before it can be handed over officially to the park and opened to the public. Sometimes things just break and there's nothing that could've been done to avoid it.

Unfortunately these days with the desire for clicks people love to expand upon a story with wild theories that are often unsubstantiated and interwoven into "ThE pArK wOn'T tElL uS!" line.
 
I’m no expert but I’m guessing they’ll have to stress test a lot of times to check that the issue that happened last time doesn’t happen again.

Yes it’s disappointing that it’s closed- I booked a whole trip down south last week with the intention of going on the thing. But it it was it is. The most important thing is that it’s safe and can last a while without majorly breaking again!

All we can do is wait! We entertained ourselves by convincing ourselves it sounded like a venereal disease. “Ooh I’ve been the doctors and have got a bad case of Hyperia” :laughing:
 
Manchester1894 said:
How are Thorpe ops in general rain/showers? Any rides not cope well?
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Last year we were there in torrential rain and most things were still running. Seems so long as the wind isn’t gusting things are ok. It was so wet, when I signed the hotel arrival form it disintegrated from the water running off my coat onto my hand. Just to give you an idea of how wet.
 
Benzin said:
Like with anything, the more complex the machine, the more chances it has of breaking. The often over sensitivity of some components also doesn't help (the airgates issue).

Suggestions that it wasn't tested enough ignores the role of the manufacturer and ADIPS needing to sign it off before it can be handed over officially to the park and opened to the public. Sometimes things just break and there's nothing that could've been done to avoid it.

Unfortunately these days with the desire for clicks people love to expand upon a story with wild theories that are often unsubstantiated and interwoven into "ThE pArK wOn'T tElL uS!" line.
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ADIPS tests safety critical matters, and no one is suggesting that safety testing was reduced.

The point is if you go by the bathtub curve for mechanical faults (high level of faults in the first few months, drops to a low average for the majority of the devices life then fault rate increases quickly at the end of the life) the longer your testing regime prior to opening the greater chance faulty parts will identify themselves and be rectified before you open the ride.

Hyperia tested for a month, Nemesis tested for over 2. If Hyperia had the testing regime Nemesis had this fault would have occurred prior to opening and public would likely be none the wiser.
 
Dave said:
Hyperia tested for a month, Nemesis tested for over 2. If Hyperia had the testing regime Nemesis had this fault would have occurred prior to opening and public would likely be none the wiser.
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Pure assumption there. The fault could've easily come about due to the sudden 12 hour day of operation it had.

Could've been tested for months on end and still broken after one day (which is also a guess, who knows).
 
Benzin said:
Pure assumption there. The fault could've easily come about due to the sudden 12 hour day of operation it had.

Could've been tested for months on end and still broken after one day (which is also a guess, who knows).
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That’s why they test for hours a day with full loads. It isn’t just one train an hour.
 
Dave said:
That’s why they test for hours a day with full loads. It isn’t just one train an hour.
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There's still a massive difference between testing and actual operation.

Especially as after a test run there's likely a load of faff and additional checks going on. Rather than just dispatch after dispatch.
 
Surely that is the point though. There is testing a ride to meet the requirements that it’s is safe and can pass inspection which is different to testing to ensure it can operationally run for prolonged periods of time to simulate real life scenarios - like a 12 hour park day.

Due to what appears to be a rush to get this coaster open the latter seems to be the bit that didn’t happen. If it had this issue with the lift hill would have likely been unearthed during that testing phase, avoiding this whole fiasco.
 
rob666 said:
Citation required.
Who says so?
No mention of any perceived risk to customers, has there?
Unless someone actually knows better?
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ADIPS would have said so...😉. It wouldn't have been given a cerficiatuon to operate passengers if it wasn't independently verified by ADIPS.
 
Benzin said:
There's still a massive difference between testing and actual operation.

Especially as after a test run there's likely a load of faff and additional checks going on. Rather than just dispatch after dispatch.
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That would be relevant if the issue was the restraints but it’s the lift hill so whether humans are on board and the harnesses moving is irrelevant to the issue we are seeing.
 
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