Space Mountain Rumours

Danger at SM?

Space Mountain Serious Malfunction Report

According to a guest report Space Mountain had a serious malfunction during the last weekend. Here the report of one of the unlucky people who happened to be onboard of a rocket-train inside the mountain when it occured:
On the hill in front of the moon our train came to a sudden stop - my first thought was that it would restart after 2 or 3 seconds, but nothing happened - it was still dark but I had first thought about whether they would turn on all the lights and we would get evacuated.... but no, we clearly heard a second train to be launched by the rocket outside and racing into the mountain! We heard it come closer and closer... the rails were trilling under the speed of the second train, while we were sitting in complete darkness not moving at all - to us it seemed as if the second train was stopped only in the last second! After that we were kept sitting in the trains for another 2 minutes in darkness without any information till the ride resumed operation normally.
According to the report, which was based on a malfunction that happend on Friday the 18th August, several other guests had similar experiences onboard of Space Mountain during the last weekend. It seems as if the problem occured when Space Mountain changed from operation with two trains to operating three trains. Even if the technical problems have been solved now, it still must be said that the missing information of the guests onboard of the ride is a serious mistake of the castmembers which is completely unusual for the high quality and sincere dedication normally encountered all through DLP.

REPORTED: DLP-Guidebook-Team on 21. Aug 2000

Expert on Space Mountain ...

How serious was the malfunction at Space Mountain that was reported yesterday? Was at any malfunction at all? FeLIX, expert on DLP's Space Mountain, editor of the fabulous FeLIX' Space Mountain Fan Pages offering among other material detailed technical data, comments the event for the DLP-Guidebook: as far as I can see one can't speak of a technical problem here - whenever a train is brought out of or into the storing area or the boarding of passengers takes unusualy long the resulting delay has impacts all throughout the attraction. FeLIX continued with some basic technical informations on the security system of Space Mountain, which subdivides the attraction into several zones. He further explains: a train is not allowed to enter a new zone as long as another train still is in that zone, therefor trains can be stopped at several positions on the track without playing the emergency breaks, this are at starting position inside the cannon, at the Mother of Meteorites (the red meteorit), on the second lift-hill (in front of the moon-projection) and finally inside the Electro de Velocirator; one after the other the trains are stopped at these points; when a train leaves the station the attraction will resume normal operation one train by the next. And his final verdict: even so such a "traffic jam" on the track may have different causes, among them the possibility of a technical problem, this seems unlikely here, as then the trains should have been evacuated...
But even if, according the Space Mountain expert FeLIX, a technical problem can be outruled with high probability, one may still wonder why the castmembers didn't inform the guests onboard the stopped trains, if they had to wait more than two minutes - it can only be guessed, that the CMs expected the stop to be a lot shorter.

REPORTED: DLP-Guidebook-Team on 22. Aug 2000

Space Mountain ... there was never any danger

According to an CM currently working at Space Mountain the Space-Mountain-expert FeLIX was absolutely right and there was at no point any danger for the passengers on board of the train that stopped on the lift hill in front of the moon-projection (more about this in the reports from 21st and 22nd). All that happened was the standard situation to prevent an "intrusion" - meaning: due to a delay (bringing the fifth train on the tracks, taking it off or some problems with passengers in the station) one train had to be stopped before entering the station in the Electro de Velocirator; but this is still a part of the track-zone starting at the top of the second lift hill and as the security system prevents a second train entering a zone, as long as a first train is still inside, the next train was stopped on the lift hill - to prevent the "intrusion" of the second train in the already occupied zone. Still at this moment the attraction keeps on normal operating for all other trains till they reach the stop point in an zone with the next zone already occupied. As the stop for the next train after the one standing on the lift hill is at the Mother of Meteorits and the train has to be taken out of the station to make room to resume full operation with all trains on the tracks, the passengers could hear how the train was shot into the mountain and how it approached them as the Mother of Meteorits is located right beneath the lift hill in front of the moon. The long waiting time was the result of some delay at the station, but an information was not possible, as CMs can only inform the passengers onboard of all trains but not selected ones and there were still trains moving in normal operation whose passengers' ride would have been disturbed by such an announcement. A real technical problem automatically triggers the prerecorded safety spiel to be heard through all loudspeakers and the lights are turned on.
So it turns out the castmembers just made the best possible work in the situation and tried to get the attraction going again as fast as possible...

REPORTED: DLP-Guidebook-Team on 23. Aug 2000