Top Thrill Dragster 2022 Status

Lowkae:

They allege the park "dismantled, willfully destroyed/removed the return side of the Top Thrill Dragster ride, knowing of probable litigation involving Plaintiffs." and that this has disrupted the case due to "inability to verify their findings through expert testing and examination, including the examination of cars on the return track."

The ride sat idle and untouched for more than a year prior to the park announcing the "reimagining", at which time, if I recall correctly, the brake run hadn't been touched. If the Plaintiff's case for securing her deserved financial support relied on examination of that track, wouldn't they have reach out to the park's lawyers at that time?

I thought the whole point of the report by the state of Ohio was to determine whether or not Cedar Point was negligent in any way. I read it. It was extremely thorough, and it did illustrate that the park (and by extension its employees) followed the rules set in place by both itself and by Intamin (which was different for TTD following the Covid year of 2020 due to limited ride-cycles). It also seemed to imply that the ride had introduced a sense of habituation to weird issues, because that was Top Thrill Dragster from day one. The weird noises that were never explained leading up to the incident probably should have shut the ride down, but maybe it didn't, because the attitude was "well, it's frickin Dragster. There's always something".

The "willful destruction of evidence" is also something that stood out.

That said, I will say this. First, I was under the impression that this was already settled out of court, and that we would likely never hear another word about it or her injuries, but that is because I also assumed that Cedar Fair/Intamin would have willingly agreed to be paying for her lifelong medical expenses.

They're apparently not doing that (or why the lawsuit?), and if that's the case, that seems pretty ****ty.

They probably didnt settle because there was nothing to settle until now though I'd be surprised if CP didn't see this coming. They'll settle out of court now and move forward

That lawsuit might cost Cedar Point the cost of the original ride, and they’d be smart to pay it.

The park and plaintiff's counsel likely engaged some type of out of court settlement negotiations before the suit was filed. Lifetime medical costs are the minimum that will be paid. Presumably they could not reach agreement on how much in additional compensation would be paid. At some point if you can't reach an agreement on $$, lawsuit will be filed. As the case moves forward, both sides will assess the risk of not prevailing and costs of prevailing likely leading to a settlement.

Lowkae:

I'm also wondering why they waited almost two years to file the lawsuit.

It's not uncommon for a lawsuit to be filed a couple of years after an accident. It happens with car accidents quite often.

This brings up an interesting conversation cedarpointer and I were having offline today.

Let's assume that zamperla is indeed doing this project. I would have to assume that in doing so cedar point would have to sign some kind of release for intimin saying that they are in now way liable for any other future accidents or difficulties.

Would sometime like that be in the original contract for ttd? Would it have been negotiated?

Cedar Point 2024: Projected High Payout.

The allegation around the evidence destruction seems pretty weird. What do the plaintiff's lawyers think they would find that the state did not? Did they even retain experts to look at that evidence? I'm a party to a lawsuit that's largely about construction defects, and we've had all kinds of engineers and experts write reports and be deposed, and that's for stuff that involves widespread expertise, not niche like an amusement ride.

2 years I know because im I in the middle of a lawsuit myself

In my opinion, throwing "evidence destruction" into the claims while requesting a trial by jury is just a further push to settle.

While I feel like it would be an easy defense, it offers up a chance for a jury to see it as Cedar Point/Cedar Fair "covering up" and adding more pressure to Cedar Fair to settle. More or less an intimidation tactic to try and increase the settlement amount.

It'll never hit trial though, with or without that claim. It will be settled regardless.

2 years is normal.

The lady has to go through a good amount of medical evaluations, and the investigation needed to be completed.

What likely happened is Cedar Points insurer (if they arent self insured) once they got all the medical reports an evaluations, and the assessment from a state did their own analysis and made a settlement offer.

From that point the lady and her representation likely debied the settlement offer or felt it came in way too low, so now they're going the lawsuit route to get a higher settlement.

What are those rumors based upon?

If anything it’ll be an announcement for the announcement. Or a teaser for an announcement for the announcement. Cedar Point doesn’t just announce huge new rides out of the blue.

What are yall talking about?

What about an announcement

Oh, someone posted about rumors of an announcement coming tomorrow and has since deleted their posts about it, making me and CPVet look ridiculous for responding.

Sooo more track been installed in the last few days. Does anyone have a good pic of how far down the brake side the old brake fins ran? Seems like there is a LOT of track with fins and I just can’t remember how much it used to have.

Dispatch Master deleted his posts.

As for the announcement for 2024..... If recent park history continues its patterns, I'm looking somewhere between Tuesday Aug. 8th and August 15th. The park seems to enjoy this time frame for new ride announcements. Just my 2c.