Coaster Zone: The Rollercoaster Social Network

This does sound terrible but hopefully the injuries aren't to serious.

BBC News article: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-32980354?o ... %3FSThisFB

Yeah this is terrible news, and I mean rollercoasters are ridden by thousands of people in the worl everyday, and this is such an odd occurance. More gutted now as I am going to be going to Alton Towers in July and was hoping to ride The Smiler.

As long as no-one is too badly injured, it should easily be back open by late July.

Aerial footage with interview with an eyewitness: http://snpy.tv/1I9rwQW

Oh dear this really isn't good, I feel sorry for all of the people who whitnessed this accident. I now know what coaster I am nominating for this months COTM.

Sheesh, that is bad! Hope everyone's ok! I bet Gerstlauer are regretting building it now!

Well I don't think they will regret building it, as it is one of their iconic rollercoasters, okay maybe sometimes for the wrong reason but one think is for certian is that this news has completely overshadowed it's second birthday which was two days ago (31st May 2013).

True, but it has still had 7 pretty major incidents in it's 2 years of operating and not forgetting it opening 2 months late due to technical issues. The early faults can be classed as small teething errors in the system but anything after the first year is something wrong with the system.

In all fairness to Towers, the delayed opening was because of the first incident, and last season The Smiler did not have any incidents, so I guess the time was up and it needed have one, but it is such a shame that it has happened this devastatingly, as well as to cause the whole park to be closed tomorrow (3rd June 2015), but that was probably always going to be inevitable after this kind of incident.

I think the park has done the right thing by having the park closed tomorrow, as this means they can start their investiagation of The Smilier without having to worry about people looking at the coaster, or taking pictures of it, I think if the park re-opens on Thursday the X-Sector area will most likely remain closed.