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Cedar Point | Top Thrill 2 | Triple Launch Renovation | 2024

SilverArrow

Certified Ride Geek
TTD will be down for remainder of the season.


There is also a photo of the supposed object going around; take with a grain of salt, as it’s very hard to validate. At quick glance though, this would appear to be a track piece, such as a Mount for one of the brake fins?

View attachment 13032
It looks similar to some of the pieces here: It's hard to articulate how horrible this all is. What an absolute nightmare scenario. Hope the injured guest pulls through.
 

Matt N

CF Legend
Ooh dear, this isn’t good… let’s hope the injured guest recovers.

Have any other Intamin Accelerators shut? Rita was still open last time I checked, but I don’t know about any of the others…
 

Smithy

Strata Poster
Just another reason I really don't feel comfortable around the accelerators - that sheer amount of force and exposed mechanics (and too much FInal Destination) and I always think something like this is going to happen.
 

i305_zack

Mega Poster
Ooh dear, this isn’t good… let’s hope the injured guest recovers.

Have any other Intamin Accelerators shut? Rita was still open last time I checked, but I don’t know about any of the others…
Going to Knotts today. Will let you know if Xcelerator is down. Does not say anywhere on Knotts app that it is closed, so I am guessing it is open.
 

SaiyanHajime

CF Legend
Ooof. Hope that guest is ok.

I must admit and I know this is a bit gross... I'm sort of relieved it was part of the ride and thus the parks fault and not a phone or something as originally rumored. I don't know if I could tolerate Cedar Fair doing a Universal.
 

Nitefly

Hyper Poster
Ooof. Hope that guest is ok.

I must admit and I know this is a bit gross... I'm sort of relieved it was part of the ride and thus the parks fault and not a phone or something as originally rumored. I don't know if I could tolerate Cedar Fair doing a Universal.

I'm completely the opposite - I'd much rather it be a result of an individual being a **** than the park being potentially reckless with maintenance.
 

UP87

Mega Poster
Am I the only one who always thinks it's kind of weird that the Department of Agriculture is responsible for this in any way when theme park accidents in the US happen. I noticed this before with Son of Beast. Is this only Ohio or other states, as well?
 

Pokemaniac

Mountain monkey
Staff member
Administrator
Moderator
Am I the only one who always thinks it's kind of weird that the Department of Agriculture is responsible for this in any way when theme park accidents in the US happen. I noticed this before with Son of Beast. Is this only Ohio or other states, as well?
In my country, amusement parks are the responsibility of the railroad commission, so I didn't find it that weird.
 

Nitefly

Hyper Poster

Ohio Department of Agriculture press release regarding the incident, if anyone's interested.
That is very interesting, thanks. Summarising, it appears that the piece that detached from the ride was a bracket used to determine which block zone the train is in.

I thought it was particularly interesting that the ride was last inspected in May and that, apparently, half of the bolts that kept the bracket in place were still attached to the train.

I’m being completely speculative, but to me that infers that some of the bolts and/or the bracket itself shattered, as if the material itself was inherently brittle or had become brittle over time, to the point where the sheer strength of material was then exceeded. Was the structural integrity of the part inherently defective, via design or manufacture? Who knows, but from the information provided it strikes me as a problem that wasn’t obvious to the park nor the authorities, which as an enthusiast would be a ‘best’ outcome (rather than it being a case of reckless negligence via poor maintenance), but we will have to wait for the full outcome to know for sure.


According to this statement the victim is stil fighting for her life in the ICU.

Terrible :(
 

spicy

Giga Poster
This is awful. Really hope she pulls through.

Metal parts just shouldn't be flying off coaster trains. Surely all Intamin launches that have that same bracket on the train should be closed and that part inspected?
 

Snoo

The Legend
Am I the only one who always thinks it's kind of weird that the Department of Agriculture is responsible for this in any way when theme park accidents in the US happen. I noticed this before with Son of Beast. Is this only Ohio or other states, as well?

The DoA in Ohio covers all amusement attractions in the state as it first handled State, County and Local Fairs and their equipment. As the state was primarily agricultural (and still is in many respects), it makes sense for big parks to be folded into the state department already doing that.

It is different per state but many states that are/have been major agricultural centers typically have a plethora of fairs which, again, makes sense for the DoA to cover.
 

Pokemaniac

Mountain monkey
Staff member
Administrator
Moderator
According to this statement the victim is stil fighting for her life in the ICU.
Wow, that's shocking. When I first heard this story I assumed a bolt or washer or something had bumped into her with enough force to break the skin, requiring a stitch or two, but it turns out she's still in ICU a week after the incident. That's rough. She must have received a real blow to the head.

Also, from what I can gather, the piece didn't fly off during the launch, but as the train was hitting the brakes? At least that's a different sort of issue from the ones they've had before ...
 

Wazzupnerds

Mega Poster
Oh boy, looks like the Sandusky Register (local newspaper) has their sights set on the park. They just published an article called "Cedar Point above the law?" From the articles perspective, the park looks pretty bad.

Link to article.
 

Rupert

Mega Poster
Yikes, agree this approach makes it look like they’re hiding something, even if that’s not the case. On a related note, I find the concept of a ‘private police force’ completely mad. Private security sure, but a private organisation that can make arrests, hand out fines, put people in custody?! So alien to me, let alone one that also withholds incident reports.

I’d echo everyone’s thoughts from this thread - awful for the lady involved and her family (and witnesses to the incident), hope she recovers as much as possible. This is absolutely something that should not happen at a park, and shakes me a bit more than something like the Smiler incident. That was an incident largely caused by human error, where the ride operated as expected and shut down when it realised something was not as expected (train didn’t pass a sensor), but got overrode by staff. This though, appears to be a mechanical failure where it was operated as normal but still went wrong and has almost killed someone. I guess it’s certainly possible this was a maintenance issue/oversight, but certainly raises questions about all accelerators worldwide (and of course isn’t the first incident on one).
 

Wazzupnerds

Mega Poster
This though, appears to be a mechanical failure where it was operated as normal but still went wrong and has almost killed someone. I guess it’s certainly possible this was a maintenance issue/oversight, but certainly raises questions about all accelerators worldwide (and of course isn’t the first incident on one).
What amazes me is how seemingly all the maintenance issues on accelerators seemingly only happen on TTD. You would think that Kingda Ka would have almost the same amount, but no, they don't. Makes me question what Cedar Point's maintenance team is doing.
 
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