THANK YOU!
They announced this WAY too fucking late, like come on. At least a week in advance?!
Project 2025/305: Pantherian (Intimidator 305 Retheme)
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They announced this WAY too fucking late, like come on. At least a week in advance?!
Take it with a grain of salt (mods can delete if needed), but when I asked a ride op about Pantherian tonight, their answer was that the cable car mechanism is shot and needs to be wholly replaced. To use their words: "It probably won't be running for quite a while."
If that were to be true, that would explain the severe lateness of the announcement. Maybe it happened over the last few days of testing. Everyone buy those Rapterra fast passes though, so they can afford to fix Pantherian!
If that were to be true, that would explain the severe lateness of the announcement. Maybe it happened over the last few days of testing. Everyone buy those Rapterra fast passes though, so they can afford to fix Pantherian!
For what it's worth, I saw one train on the service track looking through the fence, and there was even a queue TV on. (The seatbacks got painted a nice gray/blue BTW.)
Definitely getting the impression that all of this was a last-second coverup.
Ok, well at least it’s not a theming thing, lol.
The park posted the Pantherian blog post announcement on Facebook at 11:58 AM and X at 11:59 AM on Friday, March 28.
Almost precisely 5 hours before preview night.
I had a feeling it would happen, as absolutely zero of the marketing had hyped Pantherian in addition to Rapterra.
I hope the park puts a rush on it, and sees how badly we want it reopened.
SweetBabyJames
Conservative Coaster Connoisseur
What are the chances that Zimmerman/six flags just decide to axe it if it has reliability issues and if it’s still not popular with the public?
Realistically, it could happen. I wouldn't say horribly soon but I wouldn't say it's impossible.
Zero. At least for the foreseeable future
For the record, per what I've heard, @AIR is right. Pantherian's repeated pattern of uptime issues and high maintenance costs are an issue for KD. In a chain where nothing is sacred, Pantherian definitely isn't either.
Ugh. That would suck to have it repainted, rethemed, then because SF Corporate is cheap (relatively speaking) we're going to lose yet another iconic ride, not just in the chain, but in the park.
To be clear, I'm not doomsaying about Pantherian here—but I'm also saying that there is some real justification for some level of concern from what I've heard and understand.
Its normal maintenance costs wouldn't do it in, but Pantherian's reliably needs to improve. The repeated pattern of extended downtime and the significant reinvestments that have been required to get it running again are a nearly-annual weight on KD's neck... and Six Flags' patience for those repeated periods of extended downtime and the reinvestment costs that result is unlikely to be eternal.
Its normal maintenance costs wouldn't do it in, but Pantherian's reliably needs to improve. The repeated pattern of extended downtime and the significant reinvestments that have been required to get it running again are a nearly-annual weight on KD's neck... and Six Flags' patience for those repeated periods of extended downtime and the reinvestment costs that result is unlikely to be eternal.
Compared to all the other “problematic” rides that SF has removed, Pantherian’s core problem seems different. Most of the doomed rides were fundamentally flawed or had some issue that was intrinsically tied to the nature of the ride — like Kingda Ka and its launch system, Anaconda and Time Warp for just being terrible rides, or SFGAdv’s skyride for being a dated system that was maintenance- and parts-intensive.
By contrast, as I understand it, Pantherian’s recurring issues seem to stem not from the forces of the ride or anything like that (at least not since its big rebuild before the 2011 season!), from but issues related to the lift hill. Sounds like the cable catch is the issue this time, and I remember past issues being the lift motor and even the cable itself. In any case, it seems like these are all issues that could be resolved or replaced much more easily than, say, Ka’s enormous and outdated launch system. One would think that renovating or modifying the lift mechanism would be cheaper than cutting their losses and having to demolish and replace the ride. Even typing that sounds silly.
As always, I’ll say that maybe I’ll be proven wrong. But a messed up cable catch feels like a radically smaller, simpler, and more isolated problem that doesn’t fit the pattern of any of the SF ride removals so far. I have to wonder if we’ve reached a point where people overreact to any maintenance issue and jump to assuming it must mean the end of a ride.
By contrast, as I understand it, Pantherian’s recurring issues seem to stem not from the forces of the ride or anything like that (at least not since its big rebuild before the 2011 season!), from but issues related to the lift hill. Sounds like the cable catch is the issue this time, and I remember past issues being the lift motor and even the cable itself. In any case, it seems like these are all issues that could be resolved or replaced much more easily than, say, Ka’s enormous and outdated launch system. One would think that renovating or modifying the lift mechanism would be cheaper than cutting their losses and having to demolish and replace the ride. Even typing that sounds silly.
As always, I’ll say that maybe I’ll be proven wrong. But a messed up cable catch feels like a radically smaller, simpler, and more isolated problem that doesn’t fit the pattern of any of the SF ride removals so far. I have to wonder if we’ve reached a point where people overreact to any maintenance issue and jump to assuming it must mean the end of a ride.
What significant reinvestments do they keep doing? How is the lift that problematic? Seems like Millennium Force's isn't that problematic (CP my home park) and that elevator lift (technology/if different) is almost a decade older than Panth...
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