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[2024] Thorpe Park: Hyperia - Mack Hypercoaster
- Thread starter Burbs
- Start date
I'm not that bothered.
I've never said I'm that bothered.
I was simply stating that people are allowed to express their opinion on the matter freely... right topic, right forum, on topic.
Reading the topic is of course optional...especially if you find the conversation repetitive or boring.
Skyscraper
TS Member
- Favourite Ride
- Nemesis
Think this April Fools joke was posted two days early lol...
Riders can apparently collect Air Miles after their ride on Hyperia due to the height and amount of weightlessness moments
Riders can apparently collect Air Miles after their ride on Hyperia due to the height and amount of weightlessness moments
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Thameslink Rail
TS Member
- Favourite Ride
- The Smiler
Calling the person in charge of the scheme Blair Lines is probably enough proof this should have been posted on April 1st.
Ryan
TS Member
- Favourite Ride
- Hex
It looks like the person who scheduled the post got a bit confused with how times workIs this an early April Fools? Probably.
Riders can apparently collect Air Miles after their ride on Hyperia due to the height and amount of weightlessness moments
It was posted at 12pm on the dot today, as opposed to 11:59pm, or 12am tomorrow
Edit- but then...it's the 31st tomorrow. Yeah they've really messed up there. They're an AI-assisted reporter apparently, you'd think times and dates would be something AI would be great with!
TomW
TS Member
Other than seeing a couple of pictures, I've largely missed most of the construction of this coaster. Just spent the last hour catching up on this topic.
I think my thoughts can be summed up in two points;
Coaster: Looks amazing, I hope those elements are as good as they seem. I don't even think the shortness will be too much of an issue.
Name/theme/paintjob: Possibly the worst of all three that Merlin have ever done. How did any of this get okayed!?
I think my thoughts can be summed up in two points;
Coaster: Looks amazing, I hope those elements are as good as they seem. I don't even think the shortness will be too much of an issue.
Name/theme/paintjob: Possibly the worst of all three that Merlin have ever done. How did any of this get okayed!?
Ryan
TS Member
- Favourite Ride
- Hex
I don't mind the name, or what is going to be it's potentially vague styling as opposed to a full, rich theme.
But my lord she's ugly
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GooseOnTheLoose
TS Member
- Favourite Ride
- Ug Bugs
Planning permission requirements. Anything above the treeline, for The Jack Silkcut: The Ride, has to be white, so it's not as much of an eyesore on the skyline.
Ryan
TS Member
- Favourite Ride
- Hex
The white I'm fine with, it's the bottom colour choice and transition that upsets my eyes.
Maybe it'll feel different closer to the ride
Parabolic Curve
TS Member
I do apologise. I can see how a comment made in my previous post might have been misinterpreted by others. Perhaps this is a clearer way to express the point that I was trying to make.
Instead of typing
The first factor is obviously the restraint system. A manufacturer will have tested their restraint systems extensively and they will have a good idea of what the minimum height can be for riders that won't see them exiting the train before they arrive back at the station. Looking up to see 20+ kids raining from the sky, before ploughing into the concrete ground, won't play very well with people inside and outside the park.
My point might have been clearer had I typed
Nobody wants to see children or anybody else being hurt in an accident caused by a badly designed restraint system. Manufacturers are very cognisant of this fact so they test all their restraint systems extensively. This means they know exactly what the tolerances are for the seats and restraints in all of their trains in relation to minimum and maximum rider heights.
I was also talking about manufacturers in general and not Mack specifically.
And obviously I then went on to talk about how height alone isn't the only factor that can have an impact on rider safety. Body weight, chest and leg girth, missing limbs, overall development and a number of other things can have an impact on the suitability of a person to ride.
If we look at all the safety recommendations for riding Mandril Mayhem a lot of them are not height dependant. One of the requirements is a need to " have full upper body strength including head and neck control and be able to brace against forces ".
Mandrill Mayhem Family Theme Park Ride | Chessington
The world's only Jumanji rollercoaster and Chessington Theme Park's first inversion roller coaster. Ride the icon sites of Jumanji for a fantastic family day out.
www.chessington.com
However, it is generally up to the riders to read through all of these safety requirements and make a sensible decision about whether they should or should not ride. Strangely enough, the vast majority of people have less concern for their own safety and suitability for riding an attraction than all of the qualified people that make these safety recommendations. In a lot of cases the biggest danger to the people who visit a theme park are the people themselves.
That puts parks in the unfortunate position where they have to protect people from themselves. The first casualties of this situation are usually the ride operators who frequently find themselves caught up in situations where they have to disappoint the visitors when they refuse ride access because a person doesn't satisfy one of the lesser known ride requirements, like being too tall, having a chest that is too large or being too heavy.
The conditionals that can be more problematic are the ones that aren't visually evident or the ones that place an unrealistic measurement responsibility on the ride operators. Measuring the height of a rider is pretty easy, but how do you measure core strength or previous medical history. The simple answer is you can't. It would be nice if the riders always told the operators the truth and respected the safety guidelines, but they don't always do that. In the case of core strength most people don't have any point of reference for judging their own ability to maintain a tight and controlled posture when exposed to positive, negative and lateral G Forces.
To counter the potential for some of these unknown factors to generate a negative experience for riders it might be an idea to err on the side of caution. So when a park opens a ride that obviously pushes the envelope in relation to key characteristics, like having a high top speed, strong G Forces, twisting elements or quick transitions across different planes of movement then making riders wait until they are 10 or 11 years old might not be a bad idea.
Another important factor, that I didn't address in my original post, is when passengers actively leave a coaster train during the ride. Hold on a minute, we have established that nobody is getting out of those restraints unless something highly unexpected happens. Agreed, but we have all seen trains being evacuated at a mid point in the ride for a variety of reasons. When the accident occurred on the Smiler the evacuation of the trains presented numerous problems, any one of which could have had escalated the situation further.
Evacuating a train doesn't even have to be linked to an accident to create problems with difficult solutions. If the Octonoaut coaster experiences a mechanical problem with its chain lift then it isn't a huge problem to evacuate everyone. However, if you have a train full of frightened eight year olds stuck at the top of an intimidating 236 foot lift hill then everything changes. Keeping those kids calm and getting them safely back to ground level can present a big challenge.
If a coaster train stalls out during the ride itself the potential problems increase massively.
Tristan (17) zat vijfenhalf uur vast in achtbaan The Ride to Happiness: 'Ik neem Plopsaland niets kwalijk'
Tristan Denorme (17) stapte al 154 keer eerder in The Ride to Happiness by Tomorrowland, de sensationale spinning coaster van Plopsaland De Panne....
It would be unfair of me not to account for the obvious difference between Hyperia and the Ride to Happiness at Plopsaland.
Unlike Plopsaland, for some unknown reason Merlin made the daft design decision to waste millions of pounds building a gigantic 236 foot lift hill that will generate far more momentum than Hyperia's coaster train needs to cover what looks like 1000m of track in total.
Sorry what I meant to type was 1000m of track minus the total length of track in the gigantic 236 foot lift hill lift hill and the length of track in what could be Europe's longest and most expensive break run. Stopping a coaster train that ends its ride with what could be close to 50mph of excess momentum isn't cheap, especially when you have to do it every ride. Then again, carrying a heavy train up a lift hill that is 100 foot higher than it probably should have been isn't cheap either.
I wonder if John Burton will be covering the excess operating costs personally ?
So one thing that Hyperia definitely won't lack is excess momentum, which could cause stalls, unless multiple sections of the track are fitted with trim breaks.
Caveat: The excess momentum was probably generated as a by product of designing a coaster that had to meet the need for a " killer " UK's tallest and fastest marketing tag line. In terms of building a coaster that places the requirement for " marketing a poorly designed ride " ahead of " making a well designed ride " everything makes complete sense. As you where, sorry for all of the confusion. Don't mind me I'm just going to the shops to buy some trousers that are twice as long as my legs so I can trip myself up every day.
However, in the case that mid ride train evacuations on Hyperia are a possibility ...
How will the eight year old kids with their bobble heads and their undeveloped bodies cope with the stress of being stuck mid ride for 2 hours. What will happen if they get stuck on the outer bank and they are held at 90 degrees for that time period.
How will the park evacuate the eight year old kids from the trains if they have to. Will their lack of upper body strength inhibit any rescue attempts.
If they are put in a position in which they have to " face their fearlessness " by leaving a safe Coaster train to reach the arms of the rescue personal be a cool new ride experience or an insurmountable demand that will traumatise them.
People don't put safety requirements in place just to cover the things that they can predict, they put them in place to give reasonable cover for the things they can't predict. That requires erring on the side of caution.
Following this line of reasoning can easily lead up to a scenario in which people are blindly following others without a thought or a care. The fact that a lot of people are thinking or doing the same thing doesn't provide automatic and unquestionable validation. Everyone is eating marmite on toast, so it must be okay, everyone is jumping off a cliff, so it must be ok. Marmite tastes horrible and jumping off a cliff is generally a very bad idea. A consensus of opinion can be associated with verisimilitude ( being nearer to the truth ), but it can also equate to the logical fallacy of the lemmings.
There are times when taking a stand, and not doing what everyone else is doing, is actually the best way forward.
The coaster wars that spanned a decade between 1990 and 2000 resulted in parks scrambling to build record breaking coasters. During that time coaster construction was focussed on building the tallest, longest and fastest coasters in the world. If a park wasn't spending a fortune trying to break records they weren't in the game.
In a lot of ways Hyperia harks back to that time and all the marketing directives that fuelled it. In my opinion Hyperia is a coaster that is hopelessly out of date and at odds with all of the current trends in customer expectations. It might have been built with modern progressive technology, but it is clearly a product of obsolete ideas and backward thinking design. It also exhibits a naive, bigger is better, philosophy and a child like view that the more ridiculous something is the cooler it is.
The design of Hyperia reminds me of all those crazy off the wall designs that people playing Roller Coaster Tycoon sometimes make. The ones that everybody laughs at and nobody takes seriously. I never thought I'd actually see a coaster like that being built in the real world.
Leaving out all of the enthusiasts, I genuinely doubt whether anybody really gives a toss that Hyperia is 26 feet higher than the 30 year old Big One at Blackpool Pleasure Beach or 1-2 miles an hour faster than Stealth which is a brief walk away. I'm saying all of the enthusiasts, but that is probably a touch disingenuous, because I can easily imagine that many enthusiasts, myself included, don't really care about breaking UK records.
Personally, I'm a bigger fan of lavishly themed coasters that offer thrilling rides and appeal to a wide demographic without exposing riders to questionable risks. A three ring looping circus that looks like it was designed by a cadre of clowns doesn't really impress or excite me. I'm living in the present and looking out towards the future, I don't want to live in a patched and re-pumped bubble that popped over two decades ago. Hyperia is the retro equivalent of some 90's platform sandals.
Talking about themed thrill coasters brings me nicely back to the objection that I'm addressing. The coaster wars sought to increase visitor numbers at parks by showcasing record breaking rides and coasters. That was the intention behind them. Times have changed and parks have responded to changing customer tastes by focussing on thrill rides with immersive themes as a way to swell their visitor numbers.
Another way to increase visitor numbers is to lower ride heights. The more rides you have available to visitors the more attractive your park is. It is a way for the parks to give customers more without paying much in the way of additional costs. If I'm 1.2m in height and I can go on 6 rides I will have a more enjoyable visit if changes are made to requirements that will enable me to go on 9 rides.
Technological innovations have resulted in safer and smoother rides. Improvements in other areas like restraints and seats have led to rides that are far more accommodating to younger riders. This has resulted in rides with lower minimum height requirements in relation to their holding capacity, keeping riders safely contained in their seats until the end of the ride ends.
If we take into account the commercial gains that can be made by increasing overall visitor numbers then it is easy to see how a park might be tempted go with the minimum height requirement set by a ride manufacturer instead of using their discretion to set an increased height limit on a ride. They might even ask for design changes or layout changes that will permit lower ride heights than we are accustomed to seeing for similar rides.
Now, I need to be careful here. I'm definitely not saying it is wrong to make rides that are safe and secure for riders of lower heights in respect to their holding characteristics. My point is that with a noticeable reduction in rider heights across the board, and especially when it comes to coasters, the one thing that hasn't improved or changed is the people riding them. The technology might have progressed but children's heads haven't. They are still disproportionately large for their bodies and their necks still lack the stability of older riders. The rides have progressed to deliver more intense experiences but the people on those rides haven't progressed in terms of handling those experiences.
So while these new technological developments can improve safety for riders in some respects they can also make rides more dangerous in other areas. To protect riders from any potentially negative health repercussions that should mean placing more attention on things other than rider height.
This is happening in some cases. A noteworthy example was steel vengeance. The G-Force data for which is given below.
The rider height for this coaster was expected to be 1.2m. However, after some initial testing rounds the rider height was raised to 1.3m.
Cedar Point ups height requirement for its new Steel Vengeance roller coaster
Sorry kiddos. You might have to wait another year or find some really, really tall shoes to ride Cedar Point’s new Steel Vengeance roller coaster. The Sandusky park announced Saturday that the mini…
eu.beaconjournal.com
For me this is still too low and I made a point of highlighting the floppy rag doll effect RMC coasters have on younger rides in my earlier post. One look at the G-Force patterns of Steel Vengeance show the sequence of rapid changes which, combined with copious amounts of ejector air time, result in an amazing ride experience. It also shows how important core strength is to riding it safely and why younger riders rag doll so much when they are on it.
Never the less, moves that taking into account more than holding safety represent a step in the right direction in my opinion and other parks have done similar things, including the Merlin parks.
Looking at Hyperia, which I'm guessing will deliver peak G-Force figures of just below or just above 4 G's, I'm not comfortable with a rider height of 1.3m. Add in the twisting whiplash drop, the overbank lateral neck breaker and the potential high speeds and I'm even more concerned.
I think it might be a nice idea if the parks thought about using rider safety as a selling point to drive increased visitor throughput. People frequently complain when they are denied the opportunity to do something, like ride a coaster. Especially when they aren't given a good reason to back up the demand or the reason behind the demand isn't explained to them in any way. If people knew more about rides and coasters, why they close in response to the weather, what G-Forces are, how a lift hill works and so on they might be far more forgiving when safety measures are enforced or rides go down.
What I would really like to see at The Towers ( more than another crappy dark ride or arcade ) is a roller coaster museum. An interactive edutainment venue where people could go, rain or shine, to learn about amusement park rides. Gaining knowledge that is generally only possessed by the park operators or enthusiasts could act as a turbo charger for visitor engagement with the park. It would open up a whole new way of looking at the rides and attractions and interacting with them.
I love the sound of a chain dog clicking its way up a lift hill in the morning, music to my ears, but I can only appreciate it because I know that it's there and what it is doing. RMC anti-roll back clicks are the best of all. LSM launches are less musical, with some of them sounding like farts in a milk bottle.
This line of argument can be called into question because " an absence of evidence is not evidence of absence ". In common terminology it is sometimes called an argument from ignorance. That isn't meant as an insult to the poster, it is simply the term that this form of argument is known by.
We can take the statement " all swans are white " and claim it to be wholly true, simply because we have never seen a black swan. However, that doesn't mean that it is true. It only takes the sighting of a single black swan to refute the truth of that statement. What we can say is that all of the evidence we currently have in our possession points to the most likely possibility that all swans are white.
The first problem with claiming that everything is okay, because we haven't heard lot of reports that suggest otherwise, is that people don't always report their adverse findings or experiences. A good example of this is the experience some riders have on Mandril Mayhem, or any Vekoma Boomerang ( adult or junior ). I was watching a recent Themepark Worldwide vlog the other day and Charlotte complained about Mandril Mayhem leaving her feeling nauseous. Sean talked about other people feeling the same and not knowing why that was the case.
The answer is in the ear canal. When we stand on a boat the deck is fixed and unmoving. However, the boat can be rocking violently from side to side in a stormy sea. This confuses the brain, because we can see the stationary deck and we know that we are standing on a flat and level surface, but at the same time we are also aware that everything is rocking. The liquid contained in our ear canals is moving in time with the rise and fall of the sea, but our eyes see a stationary deck that is not moving and the discrepancy can confuse our brains leading to a feeling of motion sickness and in some cases a bad headache. It is why some people get seasick.
Boomerang coasters, or shuttle coasters like Mandril Mayhem, can expose riders to a similar state of confusion which can lead to riders feeling nauseous. The riders are going forwards, the train they are sitting in looks stationary and unmoving, and then the riders find themselves going backwards. This sequence of events represents a huge disruption to a riders equilibrium. Especially when it is mixed with intense lateral movements or inversions. The movement experienced on a pirate ship ride is a little different, because the riders have fixed points of reference all around them. They are not on a coaster train that is moving over ground at high speed through a changing vista.
The layout of Mandril Mayhem makes this peculiar state of affairs even worse. Holding the riders at 90 degrees for a time adds a further disruption to the endolymph fluid in their ear canals. Following that with immediate exposure to the helix, which is arguably the most forceful part of the Mandril Mayhem layout, is particularly unsettling for riders. And shortly afterwards they have to experience the slow moving inline twist. This combination makes Mandril Mayhem even more nausea inducing than the other boomerang coasters out there. Granted, different people will have different degrees of tolerance for the uncommon effect, just like people are more or less prone to sea sickness, but a marathon session on any boomerang coaster ( even a Vekoma Junior Boomerang ) is guaranteed to give anyone a booming headache and an overwhelming feeling of nausea.
This article explains a bit more about the ear canals.
From: https://medium.com/@adityascapaa/can-your-ears-help-you-manage-nausea-a9b73c5dae6e
The reason that I brought this up is that many people experience unusual fluctuations in their health when they ride roller coasters and in a lot of cases they simply brush them off without concern. Oh it is just a headache it will pass, I felt sick for a short time but I feel better now and so on. So nothing is ever registered or recorded. The same can be true for a sore neck, palpitations or any other state of change in the health of a person. However, shaking off what seems to be minor health concerns can sometimes mask serious problems, which leads me another point of discussion.
Another form of rebuttal against this argument is the " deaf monkey " defence. Sometimes people don't hear something because they don't want to hear something. Or in the case of not wanting any other people to hear something they play down concerns or act to sweep them under the carpet.
An example of this is " The Concussion Crisis " in sports. Looking at the sport of American Football the first indications of concussion being linked to negative health states were discussed well over a century ago. However, the initial findings were actively dismissed in response to bravado, machismo and inaccurate measures of personal risk. More importantly, the disturbing findings weren't deemed to be in the commercial interests of the governing bodies who had the power and funding to pursue further investigations that might have initiated change.
The First Concussion Crisis: Head Injury and Evidence in Early American Football
In the early 21st century, sports concussion has become a prominent public health problem, popularly labeled “The Concussion Crisis.” Football-related concussion contributes much of the epidemiological burden and inspires much of the public ...
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
Fast forward a century and a host of new studies highlighted how dangerous concussions can be for athletes and people in general. This research led to the introduction of wide ranging safety updates and a new way of thinking about concussion. The problem was known about over a hundred years ago, it was documented in early research, but it took an exaggerated amount of time for something to be done about it.
This is why I included the following article in my initial post. It clearly shows that factors other than height suitability can negatively affect a rider health. Manufacturers know this and they take it into account, the parks know this and sometimes they take it into account, but for me the big take home is that more studies need to be done. Evidential data that is for or against the idea of re-evaluating restrictions on riders, that takes into account factors other than height, is currently in short supply and it shouldn't be. In respect to this data deficiency I think parks should think about adopting the position of being overly cautious.
Non-Fatal Injuries Associated with Riding Roller Coaster | Insight Medical Publishing
Non-Fatal Injuries Associated with Riding Roller Coaster, Cuan-Baltazar Yu Nam, ÃÂÂvila-Sánchez Pablo and Soto-Vega Elena
Oh my god, Parabolic Curve wants to restrict all riders under the age of 18 to low intensity coasters like whacky worms. Go away. We want our kids to be able to experience more rides not less rides.
Rest Assured, I'm definitely not advocating for any like that. However, I would like to see a greater degree of caution exhibited by parks in relation to the adverse health effects that can be associated with riding the more extreme coasters. Something like a 1.4m height restriction for any coaster that subjects the riders to more than 4G's, or excessive speeds of over 60mph, or elements that could be associated with a greater risk of whiplash or place high demands on their core stability.
At least until the manufacturers, parks and the amusement industry has more comprehensive data to guide their decision making.
Appeared in the many Thorpe Hyperia hotel room vlogs and credit to the poster below
From: https://x.com/JAXXNCREATED/status/1773662053992931587?s=20
So the wise young Goddess decided to craft herself wings of steel, which we all know is an excellent material for airborne activities. You only have to visit an aerodrome to see all those steel parachutes and hang gliders dotted about the place. True, you can see rare instances of planes made from steel, but for some reason the dumb mortals that populate the land tend to build all of their flying machines and contraptions from lighter materials that are suited to the task of staying aloft.
There was nothing wrong with the wax feather wings that Daedalus crafted for himself and his son Icarus. They worked perfectly well. Daedalus made it safely to his chosen destination without any problems. Icarus died because of hubris, not the materials used to construct his wings.
Putting the material choice to one side, the current lore does beg the obvious question.
WHY DIDN'T SHE JUST BUILD A BOAT ?
You know, one of those floating things that are really good at travelling across stretches of water.
Or, like legions of children before her, simply ask mum or dad ( the river god in this case ) to taxi her to the destination of her choosing.
" I will pick you up at 10 sharp, don't let any of those sons of Bacchus get you drunk on cheap wine, that toga looks far too short for my liking and don't put any of that hemlock salad on your Kebab. "
" Stop fussing, I'm old enough to look after myself, stop treating me like a child, humph. "
" It's either put up with me showing I care or back into the forge to hammer on that daft pair of steel wings you were fiddling with earlier. "
" Fine, just don't bring that harpist to play music on the trip. Harp music is so yesterday ."
Okay, flippancy aside, I get it. A theme is needed to explain a soaring steel coaster train that reflects the name Hyperia. Probably because the need for an immersive theme that could operate in tandem with a captivating visual aesthetic wasn't high up on the initial design list for this coaster.
The question is what does this new/old theme have to do with what the riders are experiencing on this roller coaster. One that departs from a black tin shed instead of a well themed island home. The black tin shed that all of the riders walked to without any difficulty at all, no flying was needed, not even a single arm flap. How is that thematic disconnect going to be explained away ?
I'm genuinely wondering who is responsible for writing this thematic garbage. Merlin need to head hunt a story teller, because the Mediocrity Makers obviously don't have anyone who is up to the job at the moment. Queue a creepy crypt has just been discovered, queue the creepy dolls house trope, queue boss battle with a angry enemy, queue Jurassic Nemesis, queue endless repetition and a lot of borrowed ideas.
Immersion is about more than smell pods, strobe lights, smoke machines, UV and old tech gimmicks that are designed to distract. It is about compelling narratives that feature interesting characters, flowing together to create an experience that will resonate with people on an emotional level. That is how you create lasting memories, easily forgotten gags and effects, the sort of things you find in run of the mill scare mazes or DIY home haunts, don't generate moments of magic.
The quality of the current MMM storytelling is very low, it is all fairy lights and f*ck ups. Well done me for generating an instance of double FF onomatopoeia, the Merlin Marketeers would be proud.
I will take my leave now, I'm off to FEARLESSLY FONDLE the FERRET in the PHALLANX FORECOURT.
The Phallanx tank is actually a ferret armoured car in case anybody didn't know. No real ferrets were fondled during the typing of this post.
Parabolic Curve
TS Member
Nemesis reborn is actually pretty tame in terms of G-Forces. It clocks in at 3.5g. However it is pretty much a constant 3.5g in comparison to Nemesis Inferno and Swarm that top out at 4.5G's. Unlike Nemesis Reborn their G-Force patterns fluctuate wildly over the course of the ride. It's the difference between somebody slapping you twice in the face over the course of a minute and somebody constantly tweaking your nose for a minute. Both of them have an impact on you that is equally unsettling, but the nature of that impact is very different.
I'm done with all the safety blurb now. Sorry for being so long winded everyone, I just wanted to clarify the point I was making and provide a few insights and links that might interest people. Ultimately, in the absence of a healthy supply of hard data, nothing more than personal opinions can be expressed, which is a bit sad.
Hopefully more research will be done in the future and we can pick the discussion back up in a couple of years. I'm still interested to see if Merlin will stick with the 1.3m height restriction that has been talked about or raise it after testing.
I'm sorry if my view point caused you any offense. I merely expressed an opinion on something that interested me, that related to roller coasters, because I was under the impression that this was a forum in which such things could be freely discussed. I was open to the possibility of being ignored, open to the possibility of people engaging with me, interested in people with opinions different to mine, and happy to hear from people who may or may not share some or all of my concerns.
However, I didn't expect to get some free ejector air time from somebody being downright rude. So thanks for that, any ride experience is a good ride experience, luckily my restraints are secure and I can embrace your negative opinion of me with good humour.
Bert2theSpark
TS Member
You're clearly not an engineer and obviously not a medical professional, please can you stop with these pseudo-scientific ramblings because I'm becoming half-convinced that you're a troll at this point.
You've come to a forum where people are fans of rollercoasters, where we clearly know the limits of rides and what's actually feasible. There is absolutely nothing wrong with Hyperia from a safety perspective as of current, if the layout or train design were really dangerous, it wouldn't have had the planning application approved and proven designs clearly wouldn't be in such large operation globally...
You've come to a forum where people are fans of rollercoasters, where we clearly know the limits of rides and what's actually feasible. There is absolutely nothing wrong with Hyperia from a safety perspective as of current, if the layout or train design were really dangerous, it wouldn't have had the planning application approved and proven designs clearly wouldn't be in such large operation globally...
Thameslink Rail
TS Member
- Favourite Ride
- The Smiler
Btw, there is a 1.3m ride ~250m from Hyperia's station with 5.5g which has been running fine for 20+ years.
Matt N
TS Member
- Favourite Ride
- Mako (SeaWorld Orlando)
@Parabolic Curve There's quite a lot to digest in your posts, but I'm going to dissect a few of the main points.
One of your first points is to the effect of "just because other parks are doing thrill rides with lower height restrictions, that doesn't mean Thorpe Park should". I get what you're trying to say here, but I once again point you to the fact that parks have been having more thrilling rides with lower height restrictions for quite a few years now and there have been no reports of adverse effects. For clarity, I'm not just trying to reiterate my previous point, but what I'd say here is that if anything serious had happened, I do think that we would have seen these height restrictions raised across the board. Parks are more than able to do this in response to new safety data; as an example, the height restriction of Runaway Mine Train has risen from 0.9m to 1.1m just this year, likely in response to new safety data or requirements. I still maintain my point from before that these restraints and these rides are ergonomically designed and rigorously tested on a wide range of test subjects and under a wide range of circumstances. Therefore, to my mind, these lower height restrictions are perfectly safe based on the current data we have. By its very nature, H&S in the theme park and roller coaster industry, while extremely important, does also have to make some concessions to other aspects of operation, such as throughputs, catering to a wide range of guests, and even guest experience in some cases. With this in mind, I think parks can only be proactive in preventing H&S concerns to a certain extent; there is no way you can try and prevent unknown H&S concerns, and you can only work with the current safety data you have, so in these situations, I think the parks sometimes have no choice other than to be reactive. To my mind, the current data shows that 1.2m/1.3m height restrictions on thrill rides are perfectly safe. That could of course change, and if that changes, then I'm sure that the height restrictions of these rides will be changed accordingly, but we can only go off of the current landscape and tests that the manufacturers have done. Safety is extremely important, but you can't wrap people up in cotton wool and protect them from every single conceivable risk either. With this in mind, my view is that parks and manufacturers are keeping the height restrictions at 1.2m/1.3m because there is no current data to back up a raised height restriction, and the current tests have shown that these height restrictions are perfectly safe.
Another point you raise is to the effect of "no one cares about records". While I absolutely agree that records are not the be all and end all, I think that the wider public, in the UK at least, are still pretty impressed by tall and fast rides. I admittedly have only a small sample size, but everyone I've spoken to about Hyperia seems to be pretty impressed by it being the UK's tallest and fastest roller coaster rather than going "so what?" like you seem to be and like you seem to think the wider populace will. Yes, the Coaster Wars are over, but I'd argue that you only have to look at things like the popularity of The Smiler, the continued popularity of The Big One, and also the presence of mostly record-breaking coasters in things like those "Top 10 Most INSANE Coasters!" lists to conclude that records still sell and still carry a certain prestige among the wider public. In terms of your assertion that Hyperia is an "old-fashioned" ride and layout design, I'd argue that it's possibly more in touch with modern roller coaster design in terms of elements used than any coaster in the UK has been for a while. You talk about the ride looking like it was "designed by clowns" and "carrying questionable risks", but the style of elements used on Hyperia parallels that of the element styles used on modern Intamin and RMC coasters, amongst others, abroad to great success and with complete safety. I get that Hyperia's layout style and aim may not be your thing personally, and that's absolutely fine, but I would assert that it is in touch with a layout design style that has become prolific abroad and has been highly revered among riders. It's definitely quirky, but I think we live in an age where quirky is growing pretty popular in roller coaster design.
You also raise points about the backstory having plot holes. What I'd say to that is that it is a theme park ride. They are not intended to be taken too seriously, and a lot of ride storylines have significant plot holes if you probe them too deeply or take them too seriously. I'd also say that Hyperia is not a ride where the theming and backstory are likely to be especially important, so I'd guess that the chances of that backstory manifesting within the actual finished product in any significant way are pretty low. Plenty of rides have pretty ludicrous-sounding backstories that never made it beyond "fan lore"; as an example, the original Nemesis had a pretty bizarre-sounding backstory that even had John Wardley laughing at how ridiculous it was as he read it at a fan event. That backstory did not manifest within the final product in any meaningful way. I get that you personally may prefer heavily themed rides with good backstories, and that's fine, but I'd argue that there is still plenty of place within the theme park industry for more lightly themed rides that simply provide a good thrill and not much else. Look at the USA and its thriving amusement park scene, look at Blackpool Pleasure Beach, look at Thorpe Park itself to a broad extent; not everything has to be themed heavily, and there is a broad cross-section of the public that cares more about thrills than theming. Hyperia may not be for you, but it will cater to those who want a good thrill and little else very nicely.
In summary, what I'd say is that while I understand your concerns about Hyperia's height restriction, I do feel that they are unwarranted. While you talk about side effects, I still think that we would have seen ramifications by now if there had been any kind of significant, serious side effects to young children riding thrill rides. You say that not everyone reports side effects, but for anything vaguely serious, I'd argue that side effects are almost always reported, and often, this does lead to procedural change or even ride closures. As an example, Son of Beast closed because a woman reported an aneurysm after riding it. Do-Dodonpa closed because someone reported breaking their wrists during the launch. Rapids rides in the UK had many of their effects removed in the aftermath of a death at Drayton Manor, and some of these are now being reinstated in light of updated H&S advice. Many rides with shared or no restraints, such as the aforementioned example of Alton's Runaway Mine Train, have had their height restrictions increased, likely in response to updated H&S advice and minor incident reports. Grand National at Blackpool Pleasure Beach has had a gradually rising height restriction in recent years, which I'd wager is due to the roughness and things like updated H&S advice and minor incident reports. My point is that parks can definitely be dynamic in terms of making procedural changes and updating height and safety restrictions to account for new information. With this in mind, I don't see why parks wouldn't have done this on 1.2m/1.3m thrill rides if there was known to be any kind of significant H&S risk to small children riding them. With the utmost respect, I'm inclined to trust the verdict of the numerous theme parks and H&S bodies on this over opinions aired on a theme park forum.
One of your first points is to the effect of "just because other parks are doing thrill rides with lower height restrictions, that doesn't mean Thorpe Park should". I get what you're trying to say here, but I once again point you to the fact that parks have been having more thrilling rides with lower height restrictions for quite a few years now and there have been no reports of adverse effects. For clarity, I'm not just trying to reiterate my previous point, but what I'd say here is that if anything serious had happened, I do think that we would have seen these height restrictions raised across the board. Parks are more than able to do this in response to new safety data; as an example, the height restriction of Runaway Mine Train has risen from 0.9m to 1.1m just this year, likely in response to new safety data or requirements. I still maintain my point from before that these restraints and these rides are ergonomically designed and rigorously tested on a wide range of test subjects and under a wide range of circumstances. Therefore, to my mind, these lower height restrictions are perfectly safe based on the current data we have. By its very nature, H&S in the theme park and roller coaster industry, while extremely important, does also have to make some concessions to other aspects of operation, such as throughputs, catering to a wide range of guests, and even guest experience in some cases. With this in mind, I think parks can only be proactive in preventing H&S concerns to a certain extent; there is no way you can try and prevent unknown H&S concerns, and you can only work with the current safety data you have, so in these situations, I think the parks sometimes have no choice other than to be reactive. To my mind, the current data shows that 1.2m/1.3m height restrictions on thrill rides are perfectly safe. That could of course change, and if that changes, then I'm sure that the height restrictions of these rides will be changed accordingly, but we can only go off of the current landscape and tests that the manufacturers have done. Safety is extremely important, but you can't wrap people up in cotton wool and protect them from every single conceivable risk either. With this in mind, my view is that parks and manufacturers are keeping the height restrictions at 1.2m/1.3m because there is no current data to back up a raised height restriction, and the current tests have shown that these height restrictions are perfectly safe.
Another point you raise is to the effect of "no one cares about records". While I absolutely agree that records are not the be all and end all, I think that the wider public, in the UK at least, are still pretty impressed by tall and fast rides. I admittedly have only a small sample size, but everyone I've spoken to about Hyperia seems to be pretty impressed by it being the UK's tallest and fastest roller coaster rather than going "so what?" like you seem to be and like you seem to think the wider populace will. Yes, the Coaster Wars are over, but I'd argue that you only have to look at things like the popularity of The Smiler, the continued popularity of The Big One, and also the presence of mostly record-breaking coasters in things like those "Top 10 Most INSANE Coasters!" lists to conclude that records still sell and still carry a certain prestige among the wider public. In terms of your assertion that Hyperia is an "old-fashioned" ride and layout design, I'd argue that it's possibly more in touch with modern roller coaster design in terms of elements used than any coaster in the UK has been for a while. You talk about the ride looking like it was "designed by clowns" and "carrying questionable risks", but the style of elements used on Hyperia parallels that of the element styles used on modern Intamin and RMC coasters, amongst others, abroad to great success and with complete safety. I get that Hyperia's layout style and aim may not be your thing personally, and that's absolutely fine, but I would assert that it is in touch with a layout design style that has become prolific abroad and has been highly revered among riders. It's definitely quirky, but I think we live in an age where quirky is growing pretty popular in roller coaster design.
You also raise points about the backstory having plot holes. What I'd say to that is that it is a theme park ride. They are not intended to be taken too seriously, and a lot of ride storylines have significant plot holes if you probe them too deeply or take them too seriously. I'd also say that Hyperia is not a ride where the theming and backstory are likely to be especially important, so I'd guess that the chances of that backstory manifesting within the actual finished product in any significant way are pretty low. Plenty of rides have pretty ludicrous-sounding backstories that never made it beyond "fan lore"; as an example, the original Nemesis had a pretty bizarre-sounding backstory that even had John Wardley laughing at how ridiculous it was as he read it at a fan event. That backstory did not manifest within the final product in any meaningful way. I get that you personally may prefer heavily themed rides with good backstories, and that's fine, but I'd argue that there is still plenty of place within the theme park industry for more lightly themed rides that simply provide a good thrill and not much else. Look at the USA and its thriving amusement park scene, look at Blackpool Pleasure Beach, look at Thorpe Park itself to a broad extent; not everything has to be themed heavily, and there is a broad cross-section of the public that cares more about thrills than theming. Hyperia may not be for you, but it will cater to those who want a good thrill and little else very nicely.
In summary, what I'd say is that while I understand your concerns about Hyperia's height restriction, I do feel that they are unwarranted. While you talk about side effects, I still think that we would have seen ramifications by now if there had been any kind of significant, serious side effects to young children riding thrill rides. You say that not everyone reports side effects, but for anything vaguely serious, I'd argue that side effects are almost always reported, and often, this does lead to procedural change or even ride closures. As an example, Son of Beast closed because a woman reported an aneurysm after riding it. Do-Dodonpa closed because someone reported breaking their wrists during the launch. Rapids rides in the UK had many of their effects removed in the aftermath of a death at Drayton Manor, and some of these are now being reinstated in light of updated H&S advice. Many rides with shared or no restraints, such as the aforementioned example of Alton's Runaway Mine Train, have had their height restrictions increased, likely in response to updated H&S advice and minor incident reports. Grand National at Blackpool Pleasure Beach has had a gradually rising height restriction in recent years, which I'd wager is due to the roughness and things like updated H&S advice and minor incident reports. My point is that parks can definitely be dynamic in terms of making procedural changes and updating height and safety restrictions to account for new information. With this in mind, I don't see why parks wouldn't have done this on 1.2m/1.3m thrill rides if there was known to be any kind of significant H&S risk to small children riding them. With the utmost respect, I'm inclined to trust the verdict of the numerous theme parks and H&S bodies on this over opinions aired on a theme park forum.
Alastair
TS Team
- Favourite Ride
- Rise of the Resistance
@Parabolic Curve I've just had to merge together a large number of your consecutive posts - please try to keep these all in one going forwards. To add, this topic is specifically about Hyperia - so please keep discussion on that subject. Posts about other rides belong in other topics - thanks!
I thought this thread was about Hyperia not writing novels about the safety of the height restriction. If someone falls out then it will be the world’s first Mack coaster where this has happened. Think everything’s gonna be alright don’t worry about a thing cus every little thing is gonna be alright
Matt.GC
TS Member
The Merlin marketing department can have that one for free
Matt.GC
TS Member
I can't disagree with much of what you've said. When you take out the hyperbole, and I hope you don't find me rude in saying that, there are a lot of undeniable truths.I do apologise. I can see how a comment made in my previous post might have been misinterpreted by others. Perhaps this is a clearer way to express the point that I was trying to make.
Instead of typing
The first factor is obviously the restraint system. A manufacturer will have tested their restraint systems extensively and they will have a good idea of what the minimum height can be for riders that won't see them exiting the train before they arrive back at the station. Looking up to see 20+ kids raining from the sky, before ploughing into the concrete ground, won't play very well with people inside and outside the park.
My point might have been clearer had I typed
Nobody wants to see children or anybody else being hurt in an accident caused by a badly designed restraint system. Manufacturers are very cognisant of this fact so they test all their restraint systems extensively. This means they know exactly what the tolerances are for the seats and restraints in all of their trains in relation to minimum and maximum rider heights.
I was also talking about manufacturers in general and not Mack specifically.
And obviously I then went on to talk about how height alone isn't the only factor that can have an impact on rider safety. Body weight, chest and leg girth, missing limbs, overall development and a number of other things can have an impact on the suitability of a person to ride.
If we look at all the safety recommendations for riding Mandril Mayhem a lot of them are not height dependant. One of the requirements is a need to " have full upper body strength including head and neck control and be able to brace against forces ".
Mandrill Mayhem Family Theme Park Ride | Chessington
The world's only Jumanji rollercoaster and Chessington Theme Park's first inversion roller coaster. Ride the icon sites of Jumanji for a fantastic family day out.
However, it is generally up to the riders to read through all of these safety requirements and make a sensible decision about whether they should or should not ride. Strangely enough, the vast majority of people have less concern for their own safety and suitability for riding an attraction than all of the qualified people that make these safety recommendations. In a lot of cases the biggest danger to the people who visit a theme park are the people themselves.
That puts parks in the unfortunate position where they have to protect people from themselves. The first casualties of this situation are usually the ride operators who frequently find themselves caught up in situations where they have to disappoint the visitors when they refuse ride access because a person doesn't satisfy one of the lesser known ride requirements, like being too tall, having a chest that is too large or being too heavy.
The conditionals that can be more problematic are the ones that aren't visually evident or the ones that place an unrealistic measurement responsibility on the ride operators. Measuring the height of a rider is pretty easy, but how do you measure core strength or previous medical history. The simple answer is you can't. It would be nice if the riders always told the operators the truth and respected the safety guidelines, but they don't always do that. In the case of core strength most people don't have any point of reference for judging their own ability to maintain a tight and controlled posture when exposed to positive, negative and lateral G Forces.
To counter the potential for some of these unknown factors to generate a negative experience for riders it might be an idea to err on the side of caution. So when a park opens a ride that obviously pushes the envelope in relation to key characteristics, like having a high top speed, strong G Forces, twisting elements or quick transitions across different planes of movement then making riders wait until they are 10 or 11 years old might not be a bad idea.
Another important factor, that I didn't address in my original post, is when passengers actively leave a coaster train during the ride. Hold on a minute, we have established that nobody is getting out of those restraints unless something highly unexpected happens. Agreed, but we have all seen trains being evacuated at a mid point in the ride for a variety of reasons. When the accident occurred on the Smiler the evacuation of the trains presented numerous problems, any one of which could have had escalated the situation further.
Evacuating a train doesn't even have to be linked to an accident to create problems with difficult solutions. If the Octonoaut coaster experiences a mechanical problem with its chain lift then it isn't a huge problem to evacuate everyone. However, if you have a train full of frightened eight year olds stuck at the top of an intimidating 236 foot lift hill then everything changes. Keeping those kids calm and getting them safely back to ground level can present a big challenge.
If a coaster train stalls out during the ride itself the potential problems increase massively.
Tristan (17) zat vijfenhalf uur vast in achtbaan The Ride to Happiness: 'Ik neem Plopsaland niets kwalijk'
Tristan Denorme (17) stapte al 154 keer eerder in The Ride to Happiness by Tomorrowland, de sensationale spinning coaster van Plopsaland De Panne....www-looopings-nl.translate.goog
It would be unfair of me not to account for the obvious difference between Hyperia and the Ride to Happiness at Plopsaland.
Unlike Plopsaland, for some unknown reason Merlin made the daft design decision to waste millions of pounds building a gigantic 236 foot lift hill that will generate far more momentum than Hyperia's coaster train needs to cover what looks like 1000m of track in total.
Sorry what I meant to type was 1000m of track minus the total length of track in the gigantic 236 foot lift hill lift hill and the length of track in what could be Europe's longest and most expensive break run. Stopping a coaster train that ends its ride with what could be close to 50mph of excess momentum isn't cheap, especially when you have to do it every ride. Then again, carrying a heavy train up a lift hill that is 100 foot higher than it probably should have been isn't cheap either.
I wonder if John Burton will be covering the excess operating costs personally ?
So one thing that Hyperia definitely won't lack is excess momentum, which could cause stalls, unless multiple sections of the track are fitted with trim breaks.
Caveat: The excess momentum was probably generated as a by product of designing a coaster that had to meet the need for a " killer " UK's tallest and fastest marketing tag line. In terms of building a coaster that places the requirement for " marketing a poorly designed ride " ahead of " making a well designed ride " everything makes complete sense. As you where, sorry for all of the confusion. Don't mind me I'm just going to the shops to buy some trousers that are twice as long as my legs so I can trip myself up every day.
However, in the case that mid ride train evacuations on Hyperia are a possibility ...
How will the eight year old kids with their bobble heads and their undeveloped bodies cope with the stress of being stuck mid ride for 2 hours. What will happen if they get stuck on the outer bank and they are held at 90 degrees for that time period.
How will the park evacuate the eight year old kids from the trains if they have to. Will their lack of upper body strength inhibit any rescue attempts.
If they are put in a position in which they have to " face their fearlessness " by leaving a safe Coaster train to reach the arms of the rescue personal be a cool new ride experience or an insurmountable demand that will traumatise them.
People don't put safety requirements in place just to cover the things that they can predict, they put them in place to give reasonable cover for the things they can't predict. That requires erring on the side of caution.
Following this line of reasoning can easily lead up to a scenario in which people are blindly following others without a thought or a care. The fact that a lot of people are thinking or doing the same thing doesn't provide automatic and unquestionable validation. Everyone is eating marmite on toast, so it must be okay, everyone is jumping off a cliff, so it must be ok. Marmite tastes horrible and jumping off a cliff is generally a very bad idea. A consensus of opinion can be associated with verisimilitude ( being nearer to the truth ), but it can also equate to the logical fallacy of the lemmings.
There are times when taking a stand, and not doing what everyone else is doing, is actually the best way forward.
The coaster wars that spanned a decade between 1990 and 2000 resulted in parks scrambling to build record breaking coasters. During that time coaster construction was focussed on building the tallest, longest and fastest coasters in the world. If a park wasn't spending a fortune trying to break records they weren't in the game.
In a lot of ways Hyperia harks back to that time and all the marketing directives that fuelled it. In my opinion Hyperia is a coaster that is hopelessly out of date and at odds with all of the current trends in customer expectations. It might have been built with modern progressive technology, but it is clearly a product of obsolete ideas and backward thinking design. It also exhibits a naive, bigger is better, philosophy and a child like view that the more ridiculous something is the cooler it is.
The design of Hyperia reminds me of all those crazy off the wall designs that people playing Roller Coaster Tycoon sometimes make. The ones that everybody laughs at and nobody takes seriously. I never thought I'd actually see a coaster like that being built in the real world.
Leaving out all of the enthusiasts, I genuinely doubt whether anybody really gives a toss that Hyperia is 26 feet higher than the 30 year old Big One at Blackpool Pleasure Beach or 1-2 miles an hour faster than Stealth which is a brief walk away. I'm saying all of the enthusiasts, but that is probably a touch disingenuous, because I can easily imagine that many enthusiasts, myself included, don't really care about breaking UK records.
Personally, I'm a bigger fan of lavishly themed coasters that offer thrilling rides and appeal to a wide demographic without exposing riders to questionable risks. A three ring looping circus that looks like it was designed by a cadre of clowns doesn't really impress or excite me. I'm living in the present and looking out towards the future, I don't want to live in a patched and re-pumped bubble that popped over two decades ago. Hyperia is the retro equivalent of some 90's platform sandals.
Talking about themed thrill coasters brings me nicely back to the objection that I'm addressing. The coaster wars sought to increase visitor numbers at parks by showcasing record breaking rides and coasters. That was the intention behind them. Times have changed and parks have responded to changing customer tastes by focussing on thrill rides with immersive themes as a way to swell their visitor numbers.
Another way to increase visitor numbers is to lower ride heights. The more rides you have available to visitors the more attractive your park is. It is a way for the parks to give customers more without paying much in the way of additional costs. If I'm 1.2m in height and I can go on 6 rides I will have a more enjoyable visit if changes are made to requirements that will enable me to go on 9 rides.
Technological innovations have resulted in safer and smoother rides. Improvements in other areas like restraints and seats have led to rides that are far more accommodating to younger riders. This has resulted in rides with lower minimum height requirements in relation to their holding capacity, keeping riders safely contained in their seats until the end of the ride ends.
If we take into account the commercial gains that can be made by increasing overall visitor numbers then it is easy to see how a park might be tempted go with the minimum height requirement set by a ride manufacturer instead of using their discretion to set an increased height limit on a ride. They might even ask for design changes or layout changes that will permit lower ride heights than we are accustomed to seeing for similar rides.
Now, I need to be careful here. I'm definitely not saying it is wrong to make rides that are safe and secure for riders of lower heights in respect to their holding characteristics. My point is that with a noticeable reduction in rider heights across the board, and especially when it comes to coasters, the one thing that hasn't improved or changed is the people riding them. The technology might have progressed but children's heads haven't. They are still disproportionately large for their bodies and their necks still lack the stability of older riders. The rides have progressed to deliver more intense experiences but the people on those rides haven't progressed in terms of handling those experiences.
So while these new technological developments can improve safety for riders in some respects they can also make rides more dangerous in other areas. To protect riders from any potentially negative health repercussions that should mean placing more attention on things other than rider height.
This is happening in some cases. A noteworthy example was steel vengeance. The G-Force data for which is given below.
The rider height for this coaster was expected to be 1.2m. However, after some initial testing rounds the rider height was raised to 1.3m.
Cedar Point ups height requirement for its new Steel Vengeance roller coaster
Sorry kiddos. You might have to wait another year or find some really, really tall shoes to ride Cedar Point’s new Steel Vengeance roller coaster. The Sandusky park announced Saturday that the mini…
For me this is still too low and I made a point of highlighting the floppy rag doll effect RMC coasters have on younger rides in my earlier post. One look at the G-Force patterns of Steel Vengeance show the sequence of rapid changes which, combined with copious amounts of ejector air time, result in an amazing ride experience. It also shows how important core strength is to riding it safely and why younger riders rag doll so much when they are on it.
Never the less, moves that taking into account more than holding safety represent a step in the right direction in my opinion and other parks have done similar things, including the Merlin parks.
Looking at Hyperia, which I'm guessing will deliver peak G-Force figures of just below or just above 4 G's, I'm not comfortable with a rider height of 1.3m. Add in the twisting whiplash drop, the overbank lateral neck breaker and the potential high speeds and I'm even more concerned.
I think it might be a nice idea if the parks thought about using rider safety as a selling point to drive increased visitor throughput. People frequently complain when they are denied the opportunity to do something, like ride a coaster. Especially when they aren't given a good reason to back up the demand or the reason behind the demand isn't explained to them in any way. If people knew more about rides and coasters, why they close in response to the weather, what G-Forces are, how a lift hill works and so on they might be far more forgiving when safety measures are enforced or rides go down.
What I would really like to see at The Towers ( more than another crappy dark ride or arcade ) is a roller coaster museum. An interactive edutainment venue where people could go, rain or shine, to learn about amusement park rides. Gaining knowledge that is generally only possessed by the park operators or enthusiasts could act as a turbo charger for visitor engagement with the park. It would open up a whole new way of looking at the rides and attractions and interacting with them.
I love the sound of a chain dog clicking its way up a lift hill in the morning, music to my ears, but I can only appreciate it because I know that it's there and what it is doing. RMC anti-roll back clicks are the best of all. LSM launches are less musical, with some of them sounding like farts in a milk bottle.
This line of argument can be called into question because " an absence of evidence is not evidence of absence ". In common terminology it is sometimes called an argument from ignorance. That isn't meant as an insult to the poster, it is simply the term that this form of argument is known by.
We can take the statement " all swans are white " and claim it to be wholly true, simply because we have never seen a black swan. However, that doesn't mean that it is true. It only takes the sighting of a single black swan to refute the truth of that statement. What we can say is that all of the evidence we currently have in our possession points to the most likely possibility that all swans are white.
The first problem with claiming that everything is okay, because we haven't heard lot of reports that suggest otherwise, is that people don't always report their adverse findings or experiences. A good example of this is the experience some riders have on Mandril Mayhem, or any Vekoma Boomerang ( adult or junior ). I was watching a recent Themepark Worldwide vlog the other day and Charlotte complained about Mandril Mayhem leaving her feeling nauseous. Sean talked about other people feeling the same and not knowing why that was the case.
The answer is in the ear canal. When we stand on a boat the deck is fixed and unmoving. However, the boat can be rocking violently from side to side in a stormy sea. This confuses the brain, because we can see the stationary deck and we know that we are standing on a flat and level surface, but at the same time we are also aware that everything is rocking. The liquid contained in our ear canals is moving in time with the rise and fall of the sea, but our eyes see a stationary deck that is not moving and the discrepancy can confuse our brains leading to a feeling of motion sickness and in some cases a bad headache. It is why some people get seasick.
Boomerang coasters, or shuttle coasters like Mandril Mayhem, can expose riders to a similar state of confusion which can lead to riders feeling nauseous. The riders are going forwards, the train they are sitting in looks stationary and unmoving, and then the riders find themselves going backwards. This sequence of events represents a huge disruption to a riders equilibrium. Especially when it is mixed with intense lateral movements or inversions. The movement experienced on a pirate ship ride is a little different, because the riders have fixed points of reference all around them. They are not on a coaster train that is moving over ground at high speed through a changing vista.
The layout of Mandril Mayhem makes this peculiar state of affairs even worse. Holding the riders at 90 degrees for a time adds a further disruption to the endolymph fluid in their ear canals. Following that with immediate exposure to the helix, which is arguably the most forceful part of the Mandril Mayhem layout, is particularly unsettling for riders. And shortly afterwards they have to experience the slow moving inline twist. This combination makes Mandril Mayhem even more nausea inducing than the other boomerang coasters out there. Granted, different people will have different degrees of tolerance for the uncommon effect, just like people are more or less prone to sea sickness, but a marathon session on any boomerang coaster ( even a Vekoma Junior Boomerang ) is guaranteed to give anyone a booming headache and an overwhelming feeling of nausea.
I also completely agree with you on the motivations behind the way Merlin design attractions. One of the few on this forum who see it exactly as I do. I find the nonsensical, and highly worn out tropes that went in to engineering the theme for Nemesis/"Nemmie Rebo" excruciatingly bad. Like Brake Runs lift hill height, it's completely geared around marketability. I'll experience both attractions at some point for the first time this year (with my 9/10 year old daughter), and I can assure you, my opinions on both will not be shaped around any kind of crowd consensus. A 236ft lift hill on such a short coaster, and bang bang bang guns and helicopters military force Vs big ass monster with flashy red light dressed fence theme for Nemesis, has never appealed to me.
Whilst I'm sure that there is some undeniable scientific evidence behind the impact some of these forces have on younger bodies (which I think you now realise was not well put across by making the rather outrageous bodies reigning from the sky comment), I don't think you are considering why these attractions exist in the first place. They're meant to be as safe as possible, but humans don't seek mental stimulation, that is absolutely essential to us as a species, by always participating in activities that are as risk free as you appear to be championing.
They exist because people, including children, want to ride them. They want to feel afraid. They want to feel forces they won't otherwise do normally in every day life. They want to challenge themselves. They want to go outside and spend exiting times with friends and loved ones. They want to take photos and make memories to look back on. They want thrilling mental stimulation.
Private enterprises, like Merlin, know this. So they create a legal business framework to be able to offer this mental stimulation to us in pursuit of a profit. And they do this in a statistically much safer way than many every day activities we all partake in.
Fast Food outlets exist because there is a demand for high fat and high sugar foods, delivered quickly, that stimulate our brains but make us fat. Alcoholic beverage vendors sell their wares because we want to use a drug that we know damages our health long term. We know that cars are very dangerous to travel in, yet we buy them, strap our babies into them, fill them up with poisonous fossil fuels, and venture out onto roads that put our own, and our babies safety, in the hands of others we do not know because we want the freedom and economic benefits that they provide us. We keep carnivorous predators in our homes as pets, some of which could kill us and our children should they take a funny turn at any moment, because we crave the emotional interaction and companionship.
I grew up in an era when the United States Congress was making out that I was going to turn out to be some sort of homicidal deviant because I played Mortal Kombat religiously when I was 11 years old. I rode loads of coasters when I was young. I fell off my bike doing things I was told not to. I got drunk down local parks. Now, I probably drink a little too much. I broke my arm when I fell off my bike and it's never fully been the same ever since. I probably have aches and pains that are attributed to my past activities, some of which I probably shouldn't have done and some I regret. But on the whole? I look back and I'm happy with a lot of the life I've lived.
It was worth breaking my arm for all the wonderful times I had on my bike out with my mates. I quickly learnt that getting blind drunk made you feel sick, and that eating junk food catches up with you later in life. Some of my happiest memories are spending quality time with my family surrounded by love, riding Corkscrew, Nemesis on opening year, chipping a tooth on the Black Hole, and stopping on the A50 near Towers so I could throw up through travel sickness. Or summers performing fatalities on my mates playing Mortal Kombat (I did not turn out to be a murderer in the end).
Have I shortened my life by a few months by experiencing the downwards helix on Nemesis a few too many times at age 11? Who knows? Maybe I did. But the happy memories have done more mental good for me than the negligible negative physical attributes would have degraded my quality of life.
I've taken my children on every coaster they've been allowed to ride that I can since they were tall enough to do so. Maybe you could point out some negligible scientific evidence that I've damaged them physically by doing so? Maybe in your eyes that makes me a bad dad. But what it's done for them mentally, I'd wager, probably far outweighs that. We're visiting Towers on Tuesday, and it's all they've talked about since the end of last season. They can recite every single minute detail of every part of our trips out as a family together that they've enjoyed. That's happy memories and thrills, together as a family, that they have ingrained in them that will last a lifetime. Just like my own.
In fact, I saw my own mum for the first time in months today, and I was telling her about all the happy memories I had with her, degrading my young neck on these vicious coasters. getting pecked by swans, and clogging my arteries with Burnard Matthew's Turkey Dinosaurs. She said it makes her feel so pleased as a mother that, as a middle aged guy, I'm still mentally very happy with the childhood she provided me. My grandmother died happy, maybe if she hadn't enjoyed the Big Dipper so much as a kid she would have had an extra few months but been miserable?
I find what you've said quite peculiar. It reads like you're saying that coasters can have negative physical health effects on children? Any suggestion that they're really not quite safe in the grand scheme of things, is clearly not true. So you seem to have strayed into the realms of discussing the negligible physical health disadvantages instead, of which I have no reason to doubt you. If this is the case though, it completely ignores the benefits that these attractions provided mentally. Which is why this post was written in the way it was.
Now, I'm all for as much information, disclaimers, and transparency surrounding the pros and cons of riding coasters to be readily available as possible. That allows people to make informed choices. But hypotheticals about what would happen in the extremely unlikely event that Brake Run: The Ride will stall on the outer bank? Or that it's height restriction should be raised to avoid the odd emotionally sensitive 8 year old getting upset should a lift hill evacuation be necessary? Come on. As someone who has articulated many of your points as well as you have, surely you know how this sounds? We can't all sit at home with the curtains shut in misery in case we go out out in the sunshine and accidentally stub our toes.
I would also like to point out that Marmite on toast is absolutely gorgeous, especially with loads of butter and a bowl of Tomato soup.
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Benzin
TS Member
Is there a TL;DR of it?
I mean I made it about 1/5th of the way through the nonsense.
Worrying about children when more often than not the adults are the problem. Sort of post you'd see on Mumsnet.
More likely to get injured driving to the park. Especially if people don't do rear facing or have incorrect seating for the children.
Obvious troll is obvious.
I mean I made it about 1/5th of the way through the nonsense.
Worrying about children when more often than not the adults are the problem. Sort of post you'd see on Mumsnet.
More likely to get injured driving to the park. Especially if people don't do rear facing or have incorrect seating for the children.
Obvious troll is obvious.