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I’d assume these closures are working around the Carnivale dates, as the first four closures all happen from Monday to Thursday with the goal of reopening by Friday. I’d pencil in the following Carnivale dates: Friday 7th (Maybe), Saturday 8th February, Friday 14th February, Saturday 15th February, Friday 21st February, Saturday 22nd February, Friday 28th February and Saturday 1st March. Still listed as an open attraction for Sea World Spooky Nights... who knows

Considering Dreamworld’s socials haven’t mentioned anything yet, I’d say it’s unlikely. However, there’s still one more day (tomorrow), so they might announce something then.

From memory, I’m 99% sure that Leviathan has the space for a separate queue, and I think it should be instated, along with a sign out the front of the ride to advertise it. This would help streamline things and make it clearer for guests. As for the VRTP app, this definitely needs to be addressed. When you press on "Ride It Backwards - Leviathan," it should take you directly to the purchase page. Right now, it’s too tricky to buy it if you haven’t done it before, and this process could be made much simpler. 100% agree with the confusion about the backwards row. I’ve also found it really clunky getting on the ride with a backwards seat. One time we paid for the experience and were questioned by three different staff members if we had purchased it — turns out the grouper hadn’t radioed up to the station about it. On top of that, when people pay for backwards, I’ve noticed they walk straight to the back of the station assuming the seat is free. It’s a silly station design. Ideally, they should hold a small number of people in the cave and have a grouper at the top of the stairs for better coordination.

Yep, I should've explicitly mentioned that—it's likely related to the school holidays, and I assumed most people would know that. However, I didn’t notice any significant increase in ridership for Leviathan, even with the lower price during this period. VRTP might see from their ridership data that the price drop isn’t having the desired effect, which could influence their future pricing decisions.

Towards the end of July this year, following Dreamworld's addition of a second spinning gondola to Steel Taipan and a significant reduction in the upcharge experience price, VRTP adjusted their own one-shot and backwards seating upcharge prices. Both DC Rivals and Leviathan saw their backwards seat pricing reduced — DC Rivals from $30 to $20, and Leviathan from $25 to $10. Following this change, I noticed an increase in the number of people opting for the backwards seat on DC Rivals. However, I didn’t visit Sea World, so I can't say if the same happened there. As of this week, the prices have gone up by $5 again. DC Rivals still seems to be getting good usage at the new $25 price, but Leviathan continues to go out mostly empty. What's going wrong here? While I’d love to see these lower prices stick, it feels like VRTP isn’t doing enough to let people know about the reduced pricing. Without better marketing and promotion of this price reduction, VRTP might see from their ridership data that price isn’t the issue and decide to return to charging higher, and arguably unreasonable prices.

The removal has begun. Credit: JJ Instagram.

They aren't completely gone, or at least I'd like to think so. Back in the days when the park opened at 9:30am during White Christmas events, DC Rivals would open with the park at 9:30, but only with one train. Later in the day, the ride would go down briefly while they added a second train. This happened twice when I visited the park on a weekday during the 2023 event, and I’d assume the same thing would happen for Fright Nights. Was it a private event? I don’t like sticking up for VRTP, but I think the multiple train situation mainly comes down to staffing — both attraction attendants and maintenance personnel. On busy days, especially for rides like SE, the lack of staff is likely why there’s only one train running due to evacuation reasons. However, outside of those situations, it just feels like plain laziness. Long queues shouldn’t be unnecessarily long, and when they have the ability to cut wait times practically in half by using a second train, it should be done. VRTP loves making money, and if they get people out of the queues, it means more time for guests to spend money at one of the hundreds of shops in the park.

I'm not sure when TPO visited Movie World, but I made the mistake of visiting the park last Friday, and it was a terrible experience. I was going to write about it earlier but decided not to. DC Rivals didn’t open until around 1:15 pm—not great. Superman Escape was operating with just one train, leading to wait times between 50 and 70 minutes throughout the day. To make matters worse, Superman had horrendous dispatches, taking around 6 to 12 minutes per cycle. Somehow, FSF managed to dispatch twice in the time it took for Superman to send out one on numerous occasions. I finally unlocked the rare achievement of being on a Movie World ride during a breakdown. After all the restraints were checked, the hydraulic cylinders released, but the floor didn’t lower. A few cycles later, I heard the female voice announcement confirming that the ride had officially broken down, with the floor failing to raise. Referring to Hyperia for comparison, as it's better documented, the first car and the fifth car (I’d assume the sixth car for DC Rivals) have the ARB and Catch Dog mounted below. I’m fairly certain that the loud thuds and bangs we hear at the base of the lift hill and at the top when it detaches are caused when the chain dog engages and disengages with the chain. Through elimination, we can rule out the chain dog, since if it were faulty, the train wouldn’t be able to crest the lift hill. It’s the ARB that seems to be the issue. The banging noise we’re hearing now is likely from the back ARB, as it doesn’t start until the rear of the train engages with the chain. My guess is that Movie World has ordered the necessary part from Mack Rides, but given the recent serious ride issues that VRTP Theme Parks has been experiencing, I wonder why they haven’t just swapped Train 1 with Train 2 to avoid guests becoming paranoid that the ride will break down, because it turns everyone's head in the queue. You can check out a full train walkunder here: https://youtu.be/Y-GwjdXHlwg?t=702

From Movie World's Facebook and Instagram: The Kansas Twister's trains are now being installed!

On Movie Worlds Instagram & Facebook story.

When I originally wrote it, Storm wasn’t scheduled to open, and then at park opening, I was told Storm was open—sorry about that. Hopefully, this trend of VRTP reopening rides early continues (Leviathan and Green Lantern, I’m looking at you).

Back to the main topic of this thread, Vortex is scheduled to be open today, marking the first day since its breakdown that it hasn’t been closed for maintenance. I guess VRTP also forgot that today is the Gold Coast Show Holiday and a pupil-free day for all Queensland schools. It’s hard to understand why they couldn’t either open Storm today or delay Leviathan’s maintenance to ensure they have enough capacity. If I turned up today and saw that Jet Rescue and Vortex were the only operating thrill rides, I wouldn’t be very happy. Luckily, Sea World does have other things to do, like watching the polar bears (if they’re not closed for some TLC) /s Also, a new POV of Leviathan has been uploaded to YouTube: I haven’t ridden it since June, and it’s looking rougher than I remember. I recall the section from 2:17 to 2:23 being extremely rough and shaky, really throwing me around. You can even see a few of the jolts in the POV. But I still love the ride.

This is bad, really bad. I’m sure VRTP has dedicated PR teams, and honestly, ChatGPT could’ve probably written a better response. Even for what I’ve seen from Bikash, this just isn't good. Their social media team has handled things better than this in the past. Wasn’t it proven that it wasn’t Movie World's fault, but rather a defective component? I’m not defending them, just pointing out that they were very lucky in that situation.

They did. https://themeparks.com.au/blog/wild-west-falls-maintenance That's the same logic as Doomsday going 180. I've seen the ride need to be evacuated numerous times, and from my experience, it's usually a combination of events. While guests do play a part in it, with the new boats, I'd argue that it isn’t solely the guests causing the issues. If dispatches slack - and they do - the boats stack, and the whole ride system can melt down. As for the timing, Sea World actually posted the news first at around 3:09 PM, with the first news articles coming in at around 3:30 PM. My question still stands,

Photos from 9 News From Facebook From what I can recall this is really the only time Vortex has had a stoppage (in that position) that's required an evacuation. What I don't understand is the fact that Wild West Falls has one daily that requires a full 'evacuation', but as soon as something else stops it's all over the news. If Sea World didn't post this on their socials, would anyone have known?

For the next 5 days, the only thrill rides operating at Sea World are, Jet Resuce and Vortex.

From FY24 Coast Entertainment

I've heard that Jet Rescue has had its 2nd train returned to the storage track. Can anyone confirm this?

Two of the trains were removed in May 2022. Does that mean they knew the results of the testing since then? If so, why did it take them an extra two years to officially announce the Monorail as permanently closed? Also, I just realised that they announced the Monorails closure on Thursday, August 15, 2024 - exactly 38 years after it originally opened on August 15, 1986.

I get your point, but I still feel that its location could be better utilised elsewhere to improve thematic cohesion with this section of the park. What ever happened to that restaurant we were promised in that park update? The Doomsday Destroyer store also exists, but it seems to have met the same fate as the other locations you mentioned - underutilised and mostly forgotten outside of peak times. I haven't seen it open since late last year and even when it was, it was only open for a few hours a day. The Wild West area past the games can feel like dead space, especially when those outlets aren’t open, although it really doesn’t feel that way when the ride is operational. It only seems dead when the ride is closed. That said, I agree that something more could be done to bring life to the area. As for Scooby-Doo Spooky Coaster and Wild West Falls, this does make the left side of the park feel like a ghost town in winter. I've visited the park numerous times during those closures and so many people still walk up there only to walk back down... with nothing to do. However, I’m confident that the ride will reopen next year, and while I agree there’s always a chance things don’t go as planned. It's also important to consider that temporary closures, while frustrating, don't necessarily mean permanent closures even though we've seen it with the Sea World Monorail. Of course you’re entitled to your own. It’s just that the way you delivered your ideas came across as very condescending, which felt like - and reads as - an immediate dismissal of my suggestions.

From what I've heard, Intamin also offers replacement trains that are compatible with the Von Roll Holding Mark II beams, so there might have been options if they wanted to keep it going - but they didn't choose this option. VRTP has let areas like Doomsday Destroyer and Arkham Asylum (for years) sit without much attention. Still, there must be a reason they’re taking the track down now. It’s going to be a massive project, likely involving significant closures in the park, and the logistics of removing it seem like a nightmare. Getting a long enough flatbed truck into some areas of the park, especially where they can’t erect a crane, would be nearly impossible, so I get why it might feel like it should’ve just stayed up. But who knows, maybe they have something big planned - at least, that’s what we can hope.

After spending five years closed, with the last two years in limbo following the construction of the New Atlantis precinct, the Monorail has finally been officially announced as closed after being temporarily out of service. The Monorail originally closed in late 2019, and just two years ago, the COO of the company assured us it wasn't going anywhere. Unfortunately, those promises have now been broken. This day was inevitable, but it’s still disappointing to see the Monorail officially gone. What do you think the park will replace it with?

Where do we think that they will store the old monorail track... VRTP seem to have a hard time letting go of old things. Also, I wonder where they have the old monorails stored. I think this might be the reason.