Thunder Canyon Dry Last Friday

Early Friday evening as we walked through Frontier Trail we noticed a lack of activity and noise from the Thunder Canyon area. We went up on the observation deck and found the channel was drained of all of it's water. We concluded that they had drained it to prepare for Werewolf Canyon, though we thought it was early in the season to shut down a water ride. Saturday we found the ride up and running as normal.

Does anybody know why they drained Thunder Canyon? Is it something they do occaisionally as part of a maintenance routine?

It's actually drained every night if I recall correctly. I believe there is a OnPoint entry that talks about it, but I don't have time to look it up right now.

They drain it so they can clean it, etc...

I have only been to CP once before for Halloweekends. What is Werewolf canyon? That sounds cool! :)

^It's not.

^^ - its a Christmas tree lot with fog and werewolves and pigs getting revenge at the end.

It wasn't bad, but we hopped in line just before it opened and had to wait all of 5 minutes. Its not worth waiting when the line is huge.

If they do drain it every night what time do they close the ride. We always ride TC in the afternoon and never really noticed if it was closed in the evening before. I'd say it was about 6:30/7pm when we noticed it dry.

As for Werewolf Canyon, the channel is drained and shrubs and maybe a few other props are put in there. You walk through after dark and werewolves jump out at you. At the end go through the barn at the petting zoo where there are more props. The line gets insanely long for this attraction. It's OK for a half hour wait. However, I would not wait much longer. The other walk throughs are better IMO.

I believe it closes at closing, along with all the other rides. It may have just been that one day that they had to close early. Maybe they had a mechanical issue, and it was going to take a while to fix, or it needed to be drained to fix it.

The ride can't hold water. It drains because no water is being pumped into it. The water is pumped out of the bay and into the ride. When the pumps turn off, it all flows back out.

As it gets later in the season I believe they shut it down earlier.

It only takes a few minutes to drain the ride. They drain it every night and fill it up every morning. On Friday it might have just had an E-stop, when that happen the water also drains out. It could have been mechanical though too.

Again, you're describing it as if it's a holding tank, and it's not. They don't drain it, it simply empties when you turn off the pumps. It's a long trough with an elevation change (thus the lift). If you don't continuously put water in at the top, there is no water.

When you are driving around Perimeter Rd, near Thunder Canyon you will see a little half circle of rocks in the bay (I'm sure there is a pic somewhere).

That is where the water for TC is pumped into the ride...

Here you go.

Bingo... and I believe that the 4 large cylinders you see by the "drop" after the lift are where the water is pumped into the actual ride circuit...

Thanks for the answers. I knew that they used lake water and I knew the location where they pump it from (Thanks Josh). I didn't know they emptied TC that often.

Its not that they empty it (as I have learned, thanks Jeff), its that the ride drains as it runs. When they shut the pumps off, there is no new water being added and all the existing water drains into the lagoon. So, if they shut down for an e-stop, or for a mechanical issue, the ride will drain over the next several minutes. When they shut things off for the night, it drains and when they turn them back on the next morning, water begins flowing again.

Even for PB, this has got to be one of the most pointless debates over silly semantics I've ever seen.

Nice work. :)

Not really. Its not like snake river falls where they actually pump the ride out at the end of the season, or the water park where they open up the drains to empty the pools out.

TC is more like a hose connected to a faucet. When you shut the faucet off, eventually all the water drains out the other end. Whereas how things WERE being described is more like a bucket and a faucet. The bucket will stay full until you actually do something to empty it.

I love virtual earth. :) It's the best way to visit CP, when I can't actually get there.

Yeah John, I understand the process. That doesn't change the fact that its still a pointless debate over semantics.

Of course, getting into debate over whether the debate in question is pointless and semantic is, as you might have guessed, quite pointless itself.

I think I just went cross-eyed... ;)