"Amusement and theme park rides are often divisive. What is beloved by one fan might be despised by another. There are endless debates on whether any given ride is good or bad, thrilling or uncomfortable, fun or boring. But every now and then, the stars align and a majority opinion emerges, and fans, critics, and casual guests alike come together in their shared love, or hatred, of an attraction."
— Kevin Perjurer of Defunctland, in the opening of his video on Green Lantern: First Flight
When done right, theme park rides can provide up to decades of enjoyment for generations upon generations of park-goers. However, some rides can end up being so bad on either a technical or thematic level (or even both!) that they are doomed to only be remembered for all the wrong reasons.
Important Notes:
- Merely being offensive in its subject matter is not sufficient. Hard as it is to imagine at times, there is a market for all types of deviancy, no matter how small a niche it is. It has to fail to appeal even to that niche to qualify as this.
- Rides that have long runs aren't immediately good, and rides that had short runs aren't immediately bad — there needs to be evidence beyond the length of the ride's run that proves it was detested by critics and audiences alike note .
- A ride isn't Horrible just because it was featured on Defunctland or a similar channel, or if Some Jerk with a Camera or any other theme park critic disliked it. There should be independent evidence from general audiences as well as professionals.
- Additionally, a ride isn't horrible just because it was related to some sort of accident. However, recurring accidents that alienate riders may be a sign that it's fit for this page.
- Amusement parks as a whole should go under the Real Life section of Crappy Carnival.
- To ensure that the ride is judged with a clear mind and the hatred isn't just a knee-jerk reaction, as well as to allow opinions to properly form, examples should not be added until at least one month after opening. This includes "sneaking" the entries onto the pages ahead of time by adding them and then just commenting them out.
Disney Theme Parks
Disney is considered the indisputable king of themed entertainment. However, a consistent pattern in their over six-decade history is that, in the rare occasion they fail with an attraction, they often fail spectacularly.
- When Disneyland opened in 1955, it had numerous attractions that, even decades later, still entertain millions. The same cannot be said for fellow opening-day attraction Canal Boats of The World. Originally, it was planned to be part of “Lillputianland”, featuring miniature cities and people, but the animated figures were cancelled, and then the miniature sets were also left unfinished as the ride was rushed to release. The result was that passengers rode past ugly, boring mud banks (called “Fantasyland Hills”), in a sharp contrast to the colorful and varied design of the rest of Fantasyland. The boats were also prone to overheating, making the experience even more of a slog. It was closed after only two months of operation to be completely overhauled into Storybook Land Canal Boats, a far superior ride that is still in operation.
- Innoventions was an indoor space at Epcot which contained multiple small attractions inside it, usually meant to promote the companies sponsoring each experience. Opening in 1994 as a Spiritual Successor to Communicore in the same space, the attractions in its two-decade long history ranged from bland and forgettable to quality enough to be remembered as unique today. However, the Innoventions exhibit with hands-down the worst reception was the original iteration of Habit Heroes. It opened in 2012 with an original cast of heroes and villains, the latter of which represented bad habits. Seems innocuous, right? Well, it would be... had the attraction not initially concentrated on fat-shaming
, right during a time when it was beginning to be recognized as an unacceptable way to combat obesity that either didn't work, resulted in eating disorders, or (in severe cases) caused suicide. Of the four main villains, three were obese caricatures that were so bad that one, The Glutton, was replaced in the attraction proper with Sweet Tooth, whose creation was obviously an afterthought given she had no level of her own and was crammed into Snacker's (not helping is how her bio implied she should be fat and was just good at "disguising" it). A tie-in online game did include a wider variety of villains representing other habits, but this only brought up more Unfortunate Implications, such as classifying uncontrollable mental health issues like high stress and insecurity as "bad habits". The attraction itself wasn't very interesting either, as it was a watered-down "interactive" attraction that had been done better by Toy Story Mania, starring uncharismatic Disney Channel reject hosts that were hoping to get riders fit, alongside appallingly ugly computer-animated villains and environments that were a decade out of date when it was new and downright shameful by Disney standards. The initial attraction lasted only a month, and despite being revamped in 2013 to be less insensitive (and getting much better reception from the public), the negative reaction to the original version caused the attraction to be closed down forever in 2016, with Innoventions itself being taken down three years later. - The mid-to-late 90's saw a revamp of Epcot where almost all of its attractions were either updated or replaced. While many of these changes remain contentious among fans, one change with no defenders is the transformation of the beloved icon Journey into Imagination into a needlessly cynical romp known as Journey Into YOUR Imagination. The ride exists solely as a Contractual Obligation Project, as Disney wanted a major revamp of the ride before Walt Disney World's Millennium Celebration. The ride's sponsor, Kodak, agreed to help foot the bill, but only if it was done on a ludicrously small budget. Right from the get-go, the old ride had been gutted and many parts auctioned or even thrown away. To save money, the ride track was cut down to half its length, shortening the eleven minute attraction to a measly five. The original main characters of the ride, the warm and fanciful Dreamfinder and his loveable purple dragon creation Figment, are almost entirely abandoned, with Dreamfinder being completely absent and with Figment being reduced to one Easter egg and a blink and you’ll miss it vocal cameo at the end. In their place is an unlikeable host named Dr. Nigel Channing note , played by Eric Idle. The ride opens with insulting the audience's intelligence, scanning their brains as Nigel tells them there's "not much going on upstairs, imagination-wise". The rest of the ride consists of extremely brief, yet direly boring exhibitions. Gone are the creative representations of the arts, sciences, society and nature, and in their place are hollow shells, such as an empty, black room with nothing but speakers, two wall panels that light faint colors, another empty, black room with blinking lights that form unimpressive and non-moving constellations, and the supposed big finale that's a stationary, normal-looking house that just happens to be upside-down. Almost every element from the original is gone, with the ride's finale claiming that your imagination is now off the charts, even though the ride is quite possibly the least imaginative thing Disney has ever built. Opening in October 1999, this ride only lasted all of two years before being retooled into the comparatively better current incarnation Journey Into Imagination with Figment, which, while still considered vastly inferior to the original ride, is still considered a step up, with it serving as a huge Take That! against its predecessor. However, scars from this version remain, such as some show room designs and the shortened track length. Yesterworld looks at it here.
- Cars Land, part of Disney California Adventure's $1.1 billion makeover, was a roaring success. It resulted in the much-needed signature attraction Radiator Springs Racers, and even its simpler rides, like Mater's Junkyard Jamboree, consistently pulled in riders. But it also resulted in Luigi's Flying Tires, an intended Spiritual Successor to the short-lived, but fondly remembered Flying Saucers from Tomorrowland. However, between capacity demands and updated safety regulations, it could not recreate the original experience. A ride that worked in one-person disks that riders would steer by leaning — almost like a giant air-hockey table — simply didn't work at all in 2-4 person vehicles; the scaled-up ride moved more slowly, was harder to steer, needed more co-ordination, and in many cases didn't even move at all. The only way they could improve it, short of scrapping the ride outright, was to leave beach balls on the field for riders to throw; this idea only lasted a couple months into the ride's opening. And three years later, scrap it they did; leaving only the replica Luigi's Casa Della Tires store as a façade and queue line for the far more successful Luigi's Rollickin' Roadsters.
- What was both the shortest-lived permanent Disney attraction and first one to become permanently closed? The answer is Phantom Boats, an opening-day Disneyland ride featuring ugly little futuristic boats in a lake. These boats were poorly insulated and prone to overheating and spewing noxious smoke, especially when riders tried to make them go as fast as possible. They also had a shockingly low capacity, with only 2 or 3 people per each boat. The ride required about fourteen Cast Members on hand to maintain it, towing the boats back to the dock over and over again. Due to these problems, Disney attempted to fix the ride, where the noxious smoke was reduced and Cast Members drove the boats instead. Sadly, this was ultimately polishing a turd, and it was the first Disney attraction to actually lose money. The boats were shuttered after less than a year (to the despair of no one), and nowadays are rarely mentioned by Disney.
- When Paul Pressler led the controversial 1998 redesign of Disneyland’s version of Tomorrowland, he green-lit a replacement for the low-capacity Peoplemover. The result, known as the Rocket Rods, was easily the most unsafe ride Disney had ever developed. The rickety vehicles used had uncomfortable seating, were exposed to the elements, and were placed on a track design very obviously never meant for a fast-paced thrill ride. The inconsistency of the ride was illustrated when it speeds up at the start with an annoying revving sound before quickly and roughly slowing down for a turn. It kept on doing this, turn after turn, making for a bumpy ride. This is all because the Peoplemover was a slow-moving tour of Tomorrowland and, when they reused its track for a thrill ride, they didn't even bother to bank the turns, making it an anticlimactic experience every time the speed increased, turning an originally sixteen minute experience to a paltry three minute waste of time. Because of the bootstrapped ride system, the vehicles and track were frequently prone to malfunctioning, leading to fluctuating speeds and system failures. Not even a slight revision three months later could fix things, and they remained completely unreliable. It was unceremoniously closed in 2001, and quietly announced to be a permanent closure. To this day, the Peoplemover track stands unused, likely as a consequence of this disastrous ride. Its only saving grace is that it would eventually receive Spiritual Successors in Epcot's Test Track and California Adventure's Radiator Springs Racers, which would vastly improve on the concept of a fast-moving slot-car ride with a specially designed track for withstanding stress and keeping a more consistent pace throughout the ride.
- When Disney's California Adventure was in the planning stages, one of the attractions in development was a standard dark roller coaster themed around Hollywood. The plot of this ride was that the rider had to get to Grauman's Chinese Theater to meet then-CEO Michael Eisner without getting caught by the paparazzi. This would result in a high-speed chase from the vicious snappers, forming the basis of the roller coaster. Then Princess Diana died under similar circumstances while the project was being installed, and the paparazzi concept was scrapped for fear that it would be seen as being in very poor taste. So, without either the time or resources for a replacement, the ride was forced under a massive Retool. The end result? Superstar Limo, widely considered the Black Sheep of the Disney Parks. In this version, the ride slowly inched its way to a "Superstar Premiere" where they pass through scenery that wouldn't be out of place in a cheap pop-up book, bad joke after bad joke, and most notoriously, barely-moving animatronic caricatures of B-list celebrities from contemporary ABC shows, none of which would be impressive at a rinky-dink county fair, let alone at the park that pioneered animatronic movement in the first place. Suffice to say, feedback on Superstar Limo was swift and scathing even by California Adventure standards. Worse yet, in spite of negative reception all around, Eisner went on record to defend the ride, calling it one of his favorites on more than a few occasions... even though even the Imagineers disliked the ride. The ride was closed in January 2002, less than a year after opening the previous February. The ride building sat vacant for several years before ultimately being replaced with the current attraction Monsters Inc: Mike and Sulley to the Rescue, a simple, yet far better received ride that reuses the ride track, vehicles, and many of the animatronics (most notably, Drew Carey and Jackie Chan were redressed as CDA agents), but changed everything else. Defunctland goes into more detail on the situation here. Disney themselves has disowned the attraction if the Disney+ original The Imagineering Story is anything to go by, with episode 4 briefly mentioning its shortcomings.
Other Parks
These rides all forgot to bring the "amuse" in "amusement park".
- Professor Burp's Bubbleworks was a Cult Classic dark ride which opened in 1990 at Chessington World of Adventures, taking guests on a humorous tour through a whimsical soda factory. It closed in 2005 and reopened the following year as simply Bubbleworks, sporting a new soap factory theme with sponsorship by British toiletries company Imperial Leather. The revamped version, which was developed without the original design team's involvement, was derided for its many unpopular alterations to its predecessor's theme, story, and humor to suit the Imperial Leather brand; the majority of the animatronics becoming static; the dubbing of annoying rubber duck quacks over most of the original music; and the excessive Imperial Leather branding dominating everything throughout. John Wardley, the original ride's producer, was so upset by what Imperial Leather had done to it that he refused to ride the new Bubbleworks or attend its 2016 closing ceremony.
- Drachen Fire, erected in Busch Gardens Williamsburgh in 1992, is one of the most notorious flops in amusement park history. When they hired Arrow Dynamics (who had previously build them the highly successful Loch Ness Monster and Big Bad Wolf) to build another looping thrill coaster, they requested the designer ditch their traditional "copy-and-paste" elements for more modern track, support, and train designs. Arrow only met the park halfway: they used computer-aided design side-by-side with their usual methodologies, which were by then considered antiquated by comparison to their competitors'. On the April 3rd soft opening, the ride had to be closed after only six successful runs, when the train stalled on the lift hill and forced an evacuation twice in a row. The ride swiftly earned a reputation for excruciating roughness, thanks to awkward transitions that Arrow's design techniques only exacerbated. These include a corkscrew immediately after the mid-course brakes, which was quietly removed almost three years in to no real effect. It was so bad, the park advised riders to remove clip-on earrings due to extremely violent headbanging and, as per a 1996 special on E!, rider Alex Winter "felt as if his vertebrae had been broken." By the time the ride closed in 1998, ridership was almost nothing. They tried to sell it for the next four years before giving up, and demolishing it in 2002. It serves only as a cautionary tale about half-assing new techniques and playing it too safe — Busch Gardens Williamsburg went with Arrow Dynamics since they were more established, while Busch Gardens Tampa's gamble with Bolliger & Mabillard paid off handsomely. Inexplicably, Bush Gardens still sells Drachen Fire T-shirts. Get the whole story from ElToroRyan here.
- Flashback at Six Flags Magic Mountain had an incredibly tumultuous history that resulted in one of the worst roller coaster experiences of all time. First opening as Z-Force at Six Flags Great America by Intamin in 1985, the problems were present from day one. Riders often complained that the hairpin turns on the flat layout combined with the restraint designs caused uncomfortable headbanging, though since the track had long enough straightaways, this wouldn't prove to be a complete dealbreaker at the time. Z-Force was then relocated to Six Flags Over Georgia in 1988, and disaster struck in July 1989 when an 11-year old Alabaman boy passed out on the ride, and was later pronounced dead following CPR. Despite this, the ride remained in operation until 1992, when it was relocated one last time to Magic Mountain under the name Flashback until its closure in 2007. However, it was this final relocation when riders really started feeling the pain of the hairpin turns consistently compared to its previous installments, which turned out to be the result of damaged steel beams during each relocation resulting in the track length getting gradually cut down, until the track layout became condensed enough that the tight turns became overly consecutive and provided a painful ride experience that few, if any, enjoyed riding. Flashback went down in history by coaster enthusiasts as one of the worst, most painful roller coasters ever built, and even the original version of Z-Force, which had an average reception at launch, became loathed by coaster enthusiasts just the same. Theme Park Crazy and Airtime Thrills go over Flashback's turbulent history and many shortcomings in this collab.
- The ironically-named Giant Cyclone Safety Coasters were often regarded as some of the most fearsome and outright dangerous roller coasters ever made. All of them were notorious for brutal rides — so rough, in fact, that "take her on the Lightning" became Boston-area slang for an abortion in reference to one of them — that left riders with broken ribs and collarbones. In addition to that, the sheer power of the coasters meant that they were very maintenance-intensive. Indeed, a man who worked at the Palisades Cyclone — possibly the most violent of them all, and which notoriously had a nurse's station at the exit to tend to ill and/or injured riders — said that he never recalled a week where it operated daily, and that numerous structural and mechanical failures kept it from operating on anything remotely resembling a schedule. All of them ended up being dismantled in the mid-1940s due to the costs of maintaining them, with the only remaining trace of one being parts of the aforementioned Palisades Cyclone being re-used for the more conventional — and much more fondly-regarded — out-and-back coaster The Comet, which continues to operate to this day.
- Six Flags Magic Mountain's ZacSpin roller coaster Green Lantern: First Flight is widely regarded as one of, if not the worst ride in Six Flags' history. The sad thing is that feedback for the ride immediately after it opened was actually fairly positive (though some riders mentioned experiencing discomfort). It was when management at the park made adjustments to the ride after a series of break-downs that the ride's flaws became apparent and absolutely killed the ride in visitors' and park enthusiasts' eyes. Extra weight was added to the ride vehicles to keep the ride from breaking down, but all this accomplished was keeping the ride vehicles from making complete revolutions during the ride and keeping riders upright. Not only did this eliminate one of the main draws of ZacSpin coasters, but this meant passengers would be thrashed forward and backwards throughout the winding ride without a break, resulting in riders leaving the ride either black-and-blue or as green as a Green Lantern Battery from nausea. Most infamously of all, the ride quickly gained a reputation for being absolute murder on riders' crotches due to the designs of the ride vehicles' restraints combined with the aforementioned thrashing. The ride quickly went down in history as a misfire of galactic proportions, and by the time it closed almost nobody was riding it. Few missed it when it was removed in 2017 to be moved to La Ronde in Montreal, Quebec and rebranded as Vipére. However, its intended 2020 opening was delayed due to the COVID-19 Pandemic. Eventually, in 2022, it was confirmed that the plans for the relocation were canceled, ending the ride's legacy for good. Famed coaster enthusiast Airtime Thrills has made it no secret that he considers it to be the worst coaster ever built due to how physically painful the experience is, topping other horrible coasters such as Son of Beast and Windjammer Surf Racers. Kevin Perjurer of Defunctland goes over the ride's ultimate failure here.
- Casino Pier has run the gamut from Crappy Carnival fare to Six Flags-caliber rides, and Pirate's Hideaway set the former threshold for the park. Built as a replacement to older coaster Wizard's Cavern around the same basic partially-indoor coaster idea, Pirate's Hideaway is a children's coaster themed around pirates, with heights and speeds that would be palatable for children. Sounds innocent enough, except the ride is also painfully rough; with each drop, sharp turn, and brake run slamming the riders every which way, despite the ride going at a relatively slow speed in a tiny footprint. The pirate façade is just that; while the exterior is vibrantly decorated with pirate-themed paintings and décor shaped around the initial drops, and the pirate ship-themed trains are nice to look at; the interior is a completely barren, warehouse-like room with no decor or attempts to hide the layout to speak of, which completely nullifies the surprise and Willing Suspension of Disbelief indoor rides aim for. Theme Park Crazy compares the ride to "being locked inside a pirate ship's bathroom in the middle of a hurricane". Meanwhile, Theme Park Review gives their commentary while on the ride; the riders' pained tones and palpable disappointment at the rough ride and total lack of effort beyond the initial window dressing afterward are enough to ensure this ride's spot on this page.
- In 2000, King's Island (then owned by Paramount Parks) opened Son of Beast, a "sequel" to the park’s classic wooden coaster The Beast. As the fastest and tallest wooden coaster in the world, and the only one to feature an inversion, it was an ambitious ride. The problem was that none of that actually translated into a good ride experience. The issues started before it had even been completed, as its manufacturer, Roller Coaster Corporation of America (RCCA) was fired during construction, and when the ride opened, it closed after two days for repairs and did not open again until almost two months later. While initial reviews were fairly positive, the ride deteriorated rapidly over the course of the year, and Paramount Parks would go on to sue RCCA and some of their contractors for poor work and materials. Over the following years, the ride gained a reputation for being so horrifically violent and rough that people would step off in a great deal of pain, and ridership steadily declined, while Son of Beast in enthusiast circles became shorthand for "shit". Two incidents sealed its fate. The first was in 2006, when a damaged support section created a dip in the track that violently jolted the train and sent 27 people to the hospital, got the ride closed down for the rest of the season, and got its trains (which were notoriously large and heavy, and created much undue stress on the track) replaced with much lighter trains (which also forced the removal of the loop, as the new trains could not navigate it). Ridership did not pick up and was still almost non-existent when it reopened the following year, and after a woman reportedly had a brain aneurysm in 2009 (which was found to be unsubstantiated, but the damage was done), the ride closed for good and moldered until 2012, when it was finally demolished and replaced with the infinitely better-received Banshee in 2014. However, King's Island has not tried to erase the coaster from history. Banshee's queue, which features a graveyard for defunct King's Island attractions, has a memorial with the Son of Beast logo on it, topped off with an eternal flame.
- Submarine Quest was planned as the flagship attraction for SeaWorld San Diego's new "Ocean Explorer" realm in 2017. The ride was originally conceived as an elevated track with dark ride portions through aquariums, with a touchscreen game on the ride vehicle encouraging riders to note the creatures they saw around them. Despite the massive hype for the attraction, guests were disappointed to discover that this "submarine" ride was not underwater, but mostly took place in broad daylight, and most of the "animal life" consisted of simple props or electronic displays. Most of the effort had gone into the ride vehicle and its touchscreen game, but the game's controls were confusing and didn't actually affect the ride; for example, there's a button riders can press to open a hatch... which opens immediately after getting the instruction, before you can even press anything. The ride also saw frequent technical difficulties that got increasingly worse; so by the end of its run, it barely operated at all. Submarine Quest received negative reviews from both riders and news publications, leading to a rebrand specifying that the ride was only for very young guests. This didn't do much good, as it quietly closed less than a year after opening. CEO Joel Manby cited it as the one true disappointment of his run, stepping down from his position not long after its closure. Defunctland unravels the history of the ride here. To top it off, competing park LEGOLAND California later opened LEGO City Deep Sea Adventure, an underwater submarine ride with a similar touchscreen game and real sea creatures; many fans drew comparisons to Submarine Quest, remarking with surprise that the LEGO ride ironically had far more to do with ocean exploration than the SeaWorld ride.
- Terminus is a fair-level dark ride operated by Reithoffer Shows that outwardly advertises itself as a harrowing adventure where the riders dodge zombies and a caged up monster, which isn’t even remotely true. Instead of avoiding zombies, the riders avoid... absolutely nothing. Much like Pirate's Hideaway above, the ride basically amounts to the riders slowly trudging through a giant metal box with very little scenery to be seen nor any real scares or thrills to be had beyond a very brief drop and the only noises to be heard being the rattly carts the riders sit in, making for an incredibly boring ride experience. On top of this, due to the black exterior of the ride, the ride’s interior would reportedly get unbearably hot on summer days and make riders feel like they were riding through an oven instead of a warehouse ostensibly filled with zombies. All in all, a complete and total rip-off — not just to those who ride it, but those who buy it for their fair, as Reithoffer's website claims that there are zombies along the path. Theme Park Crazy conducted a poll for worst dark ride among his users for a future video, and this ride was number one on the list, beating even the above-mentioned Superstar Limo by a landslide.
- Opening in 1998 at the small M&D's Theme Park in Scotland, Tornado was an especially infamous ride that gave new meaning to the word "painful". One of only two RC70 model coasters built by Pinfari, it was their largest model; packing in several swooping turns and three inversions — two loops and a corkscrew — in a compact, portable layout. However, even at its debut, it was known for being notoriously bad with its rough ride and hard, high over-the-shoulder restraints leaving painful headbanging more-or-less unavoidable regardless of your height. The corkscrew in particularnote was infamous for being one of the most horrific inversions ever put to a coaster, to the point it was removed and replaced with a banked curve in 2006; the fact that the only known POV of it outright caused the camera to violently glitch should tell you everything. A major 2016 incident involving another coaster in the park (Tsunami) sealed Tornado's fate there, when a flawed inspection lead to its train derailing and crashing, injuring 10 people. It was not-so subtly covered up by a travelling funhouse and left standing but not operating for a long time, before being dismantled and sold on to a French travelling fair in 2020. There, it was refurbished and eventually reopened in 2021 as Gotham, complete with a new Batman-based theme. Even so, most UK coaster enthusiasts were quite happy to see it taken off their hands.
- While the roller coaster models designed by Italian manufacturer Zamperla tend to be a bit of a mixed bag among enthusiasts, one thing almost all of them can agree on is that their Volare (To Fly in Italian) model is just dreadful beyond belief. Designed to be a low-space, traveling budget version of the classic flying coaster design, it's designed around a spiral lift hill, sharp turns and inline twists, and lay-down cars designed to have unimpeded views of what's ahead. In practice, the claustrophic, cage-like cars cause very painful head-banging on top of not even being able to see much out of them, which isn't helped by a jerky, uncomfortable layout that somehow manages to be both boring and too intense; due to a generally shoddy build quality — even for a traveling coaster — that many riders have even gone on record saying they felt unsafe on. One of these Zamperla Volare roller coasters includes Time Warp in Canada's Wonderland.
- In 1997, Knott's Berry Farm opened Windjammer Surf Racers. Built by TOGO, this was a surfing-themed dueling coaster that was intended as a tribute to the beloved but by-then dated Wacky Soap Box Racers coaster that it replaced. However, when the ride opened, everything that could have gone wrong did go wrong. Firstly, the ride would have a habit of continuous breakdowns. And ironically, it was especially prone to breaking down in winds as low as three miles an hour. But even when it did operate, the ride was nowhere near a pleasant experience; despite the dueling feature being a large part of the ride's appeal, the trains almost never raced. Not to mention, the attraction was incredibly rough with tight restraints and jittery track, the layouts were very dull beyond the loops above the water; with lots of long, slow turns and precious little airtime or forces to speak of. Riders would spend less time enjoying the ride and more wondering if the train was going to drop off the track. Upon opening, the ride was immediately hated by park-goers and coaster enthusiasts. This all culminated in Knott's suing TOGO for the coaster's poor engineering. Finally, in 2000, Windjammer was closed for good — much to the sadness of no one — and after being torn apart for scrap, would soon be replaced by the Xelerator in 2002. Needless to say, the new launched coaster received a far more positive reception than its predecessor; and the park would eventually revisit the idea of a surfing-themed thrill coaster, opening the considerably more successful HangTime in 2018.
