Wild Thing DERAILED!!!

I heard just like 2 min. ago from a patron on TPR that Wild Thing @ Vallyfair has derailed and 13 are injured and 1 head injury! More info to come.

That's what they get for their inside wheel stucture.

Wow, if this is real I hope its not closed for good. Wild Thing is one of my favorite coasters.

Edit: I'm going to see if this is on the news here at all. It sounds like it could be the same thing that happened to Steel Dragon. That's a Morgan too isnt it?

Well, I don't know if this is the case or not, but it would seem to me that coasters would be more likely to derail with track that has a narrower guage.

Ok yes it was on the news... The back car lost an upstop and flew into the sation... 17 injured 13 at the hospital and 1 head injury...

Ok, on the news they're showing helicopter shots of the ride and there is a train in the station, one on the transfer track, and one of the final brake run that has 5 cars instead of 6, and the 5th is not completely on the rails either, but still attached to the train. The 6th car is sitting off to the side of the track at the begining of the brake run. They still havn't said exactly what happened yet though, other than that 13 are in the hospital.

This brings up a question how are these cars coupled together? string?[lol]

http://www.themeparkreview.com/forum/vi ... hp?t=25255 scroll down a bit for a pic...

The real story here... http://wcco.com/topstories/local_story_141180956.html

http://wcco.com/topstories/local_story_141180956.html

Ha, I win!

beat you to it haha... i just edited it to put a "L" on "real"

Actually, I beat you. The ha, I win part was added in later. Before, I had beat you by 7 seconds.

darn[lol]

There's a video on http://www.wcco.com now of the helicopter shots that were on the news, and also you can see that they've covered both derailed cars and the wheel set that fell off.

www.kstp.com was RELATIVELY fair in its report. There was nothing like interviews with crying onlookers, no "I COULDA DIED!!!" passengers, no blatant sensationalism... but at the end, the reporter said that some ambulance went by "in the direction of Valleyfair's entrance" and she was digging to see if "maybe another ride has had an accident".

The pics are unfortunate, however, since there are several pics of the back car sitting at an angle... uninformed viewers might not realize that the pics were taken after maintenance propped up the car to examine the undercarriage. They might see them and think the car tilted that way on its own...

Yeh, I was watching kstp and they were saying that one side of Xtreme Swing wasn't running and that it "might have had an accident too." It seems like they're trying to make everyone scared that the whole park is falling apart.

Maybe this is all part of a sabotage and Robb alvey is behind it!!![lol]

Originally posted by minicoopertx

The pics are unfortunate, however, since there are several pics of the back car sitting at an angle... uninformed viewers might not realize that the pics were taken after maintenance propped up the car to examine the undercarriage. They might see them and think the car tilted that way on its own...

On www.wcco.com there are pics of that car being unloaded and it is already on its side.

Yeh, everything I've seen says it tipped over when it derailed, not after.

^That is probably true because on the site below, they interviewed someone on the rear car, and she said that she was jerked and twisted very badly. That most likely would not happen unless it was derailed and moving.

http://www.kstp.com/article/stories/S16428.html?cat=1

This sucks! i was looking forward to riding it during my visit up there in july. I hope it opens by then.... but the chances of that happening are very slim.

http://www.twincities.com/mld/twincitie ... 636698.htm
Here's todays story from the St. Paul paper. No one was hurt very badly at all and Valleyfair is going to start their investigation as soon as an "independant company" is there to confirm and document everything. Hopefully the ride will be up and running by the end of this season.

Well, they found the cause.

http://www.twincities.com/mld/twincities/14665902.htm

Sunday's Valleyfair rollercoaster accident that hurt 15 riders resulted from a malfunctioning mounting bracket on the track, the amusement park said today.

The bracket damaged the rear axle of the fifth car in the roller coaster train, causing the sixth car to come uncoupled.

Those who were injured were riding in the sixth car, and they suffered sprains and other injuries when the car came to an abrupt stop and tilted on the track. The riders were able to climb out of the car and take a catwalk back to the boarding platform.

The incident happened as the train was nearing the platform at the end of its three-minute run. In that section of track, brakes slow the train ????????? which reaches speeds of 74 mph ????????? and then stop it at a platform where riders board and climb out.

Valleyfair officials did not say what caused the mounting bracket to malfunction. But the park said it and two local engineering firms "will thoroughly inspect and test all aspects of the ride and will make the appropriate modifications to the ride."

Once those changes are made, the ride will be re-inspected and tested before it re-opens, the park said.

Looks like it should be open in a month or so.[:D]

http://www.startribune.com/462/story/466112.html
Alright, its fixed and open already, they just finished testing it last night. I'm glad they got it up and running so fast.