Tsunami/Thriller/Zonga/TT closed & for sale

[ECG]

Yay! One of my favorite traveling coasters, Tsunami at Isla San Marcos Parque Temático in Aguascalientes, Mexico has closed down and is ready to be sold. The reason I'm so happy about the coaster shutting down is because it only ran once a year at the festival and it's always been very difficult for me to get down there at that time of year. I haven't had the chance to ride it since it left Germany and I've always wanted to give it another go in spite of it being "ruined" by Premier Rides after making the trip across the Atlantic.
Hopefully a park that I can actually get to will purchase it and I'll have the chance to finally ride it again.

From RCDB's Facebook page

For those not familiar with the Schwarzkopf quadruple looper, it was originally called Thriller on the German fair circuit when I rode it at the Oktoberfest and was then relocated to the Gröna Lund parking lot for a year (1996) before heading to Six Flags AstroWorld (Texas Tornado) from 1998-2000, then to Six Flags Marine World aka Discovery Kingdom (Zonga) for the 2003-2004 season before ending up in Mexico in 2008.

Here's what it looked like back in its glory days with original paint scheme the first time I rode it:

And with new paint scheme the last time I rode it:

 

[TilenB]

That's some good news, Jerry, since there were rumours not too long ago of it being sold for scrap. It's nice to see they are giving it another chance and planning to sell it. It would be a shame of seeing it go, hopefully some European park or showman will be there to bring it back to the old continent.

 

[ECG]

I think a European park is very unlikely as that was tried late last year. After general overhaul, the coaster was going to reopen in 2016 at Skyline Park, but a necessary safety upgrade needed to meet German safety standards (TÜV) would have been too cost-intensive and the owner of the park finally canceled the undertaking.

 

[SilverArrow]

Anyone know what sort of safety upgrades are needed?

I can't imagine that it is super desirable judging by how difficult it has been to shift the two UK Schwarzkopfs, although this is obviously a superior ride it is also a much larger thing to ship around. Fingers crossed for good news though.

 

[GuyWithAStick]

Re: Tsunami/Thriller/Zonga/TT closed & for sale

Next to Tennessee Tornado, that's probably the wonkiest set of loops I've ever seen

Sent from my VS840 4G using Tapatalk

 

[sparky2u]

Let's hope a park can buy it or it can go back on the traveling circuit with Olympic Looping, don't scrap it.

 

[SimonSays99]

The main problem with Thriller returning to Skyline Park was that the current operator has "lost" or "misplaced" the original operating manuals and German TÜV certification. So - as the TÜV also had no backups - the only option was to re-certify to current standards with was out of question. Some other sources rumored that the coaster was upon local inspection in a way worse condition than the current operator said it is.

At the time many German enthusiasts asked about the planned updates and there was a rumor that Gerstlauer was connected to the project until it was cancelled. The park once said that it was planned to get new trains. Nothing about undoing the Premier modifications.

I think its unlikely that some first world country will buy this as to speed the coaster up to today's safety regulations is too expensive and a park could better buy a new coaster. If we are lucky a Middle- or South-American will pick this up. If not I guess the coaster will be scrapped.

Personally I think that Thriller is the best Schwarzkopf ever built and still happy that have ridden it many times on the Hamburger DOM funfair in my teens. The first drop and the Gs between the first two loops were crazy. And the pacing was heartpounding, the blockbrakes only there for safety in normal operation not slowing down the train... =D>

This great footage was shot in Hamburg with professional movie equipment at the time and includes off-ride as well as front- and rear-seat POVs: [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXI8KJnNZ9Q[/youtube]

 

[Gavin]

I think its unlikely that some first world country will buy this as to speed the coaster up to today's safety regulations is too expensive and a park could better buy a new coaster. If we are lucky a Middle- or South-American will pick this up. If not I guess the coaster will be scrapped.

That's what I would've thought as well. When was the last time any Western park took on something like this? Must be Camelot with BMRX/Knightmare, surely? Whereas a few of these old rides have been cropping up in Mexico. I'm not up on my Latin American parks so much, so I don't know if any parks there would be in the market for it, but since this thing is in Mexico already, I agree with you that it'll either end up somewhere fairly local or be for the scrapheap.