Downtime on 8/15

Some of my friends from the crew just called me and told me that at around 6:30 tonight the train appearently starting going up the lift, but then made it about 15 feet and rolled back into the station. The catch car then caught it again, and starting to pull it up again at which point the ride was E-Stopped. It figures, the day I process out something like this happens :)

Wouldn't the anti rollbacks catch it before it came into the station?
Did the catch car break or something? Why would it roll back?

Man Jordan, it stinks that we weren't working today!

No, it wasn't up high enough for the rollbacks to kick in, the entire train wasn't even out of the station yet.

Wow, that's really scary. Yeah, if you look at the track closely there's some black gritty stuff for those first few (15-20?) feet then the slots for the anti rollbacks start. Maybe those are supposed to be the anti rollbacks? Please, for the love of god, don't take that seriously, haha.

P.S. Is that you Cheryl?

Well that means its going to be down all day today. At least it rolled back at 15 feet though. If it rolled back any higher, there would be serious damage and possible Injuries.

If it rolled back higher (say if the cable snapped) then the anit-rollbacks would kick in.

Hey all. I was in that line! (Bright yellow custom made millennium force shirt) Anyways, it stopped and like half of the train was still in the station so it wasn't up that high at all. It was even down today when I was leaving the park, train still stuck in the same position. Must be something serious. I waiting in that line for about 2 hours when it was down, and eventually i got to the ramp, and they forced us out of line and said it was closed. Like, they couldn't tell us right off the bat if its gonna reopen or close for the night. I am so upset about that. I mean, if they could simply tell us that the cable lift broke or something, then it would save all of that pointless waiting! It seems as if the ride ops pretend to not know what happened cause not one ride op seemed to know. It's like, why dont the mechanics tell them what is going on, and if they should close the ride for the night or not. Idk, but besides that, It was sooo busy 8/15! Lines were INSANE! And today, the line for blue streak was out of the queue at 12 pm....WTF. I disagree when they say july is busiest. I went july 14th and it wasnt busy at all. I can see weekends, but it's a monday!! And today (tuesday) seemed to be busier than yesterday! Idk what that is all about.

Was anyone else in the line for the millennium when it broke down, and if so, how long did you wait?

Matt Magnone

Full Force 2000, we didn't know what was going on when all this happened last night. We kept people in line because we thought we would re-open the ride. I can't really say anymore then that. I'm sorry that you waited and we eventually cleared out the line. We can only say so much, and are told to say certain things. I"ve probably said too much but oh well. I hope thats a good enough explaination for you. All I know is we wouldn't keep you in line if we knew it wouldn't re-open or be an extremely long time.

Hey, thanks SCarolina01. It is awesome to hear from a ride op of my favorite ride! You guys are my idols!! I probably saw you there. Where where you at when everyone was walking on the ramp to leave the ride when they announced it was closed? I wanted to stay there. I wish someone would have let me in the station, I love that ride so much, even if its broken down. LOL. I kind of figured that you guys probably can't say certain things about what happens when something breaks down.

You guys do an awesome job operating Millennium Force. I saw Chad yesterday also! I never have time to say hi or talk to him though, o well, maybe next time!

By the way, there was a black ride op at the entrance of the line who loved my custom made Millennium Force shirt. Just wondering if you knew who he was, he was pretty cool!

Was his name Carlos?

I was there Tuesday, early in the day I walked by it and there was no one near, no employees in line or anything, then later, like around 4, and there was a line forming and employees in front like they were just about to open it. We were told by the workers that it may open and there was an empty train that had gone up earlier, I never saw that so I cant confirm it. Then about 15 min. later they started to tell us, "slim to none" chance of opening that night, so for a second we were sure it was gonna open I don't think it ever did.

I remember MF having a similar station/lift rollback in 2000 or 2001. It may have been during Coastermania or Millennium Mania. I can't remember many of the details except that there were a lot of excited enthusiasts on the ride. I even think Rideman was one of them.

The cause of the catch car slip I believe was due to lots of dead muffleheads clogging up the catch dog. Luckily, it didn't take very long for us to reopen the ride back then. We just brought the catch car back down to the train and ran it up in manual mode. I suspect that this most recent event involves a more critical problem.

Hey, you never know. Over the last few weeks the bugs have been insane. A few weeks ago, I saw the train come back and the two people in the front row were completely covered, and I couldn't even see their faces! They stood on the ramp for about 10 minutes, just wiping the bugs off before they went down.