The Trials and Tribulations of an S&S Skyswat.

Slammer, in a rare moment of it being open

The troublesome tales of Slammer, an S&S Skyswat at Merlin’s Thorpe Park are well documented. Here is a ride that was promised by the park as the next big thrill ride. The opposite occured as the ride was plagued with down time. Even today, the 105 foot paddle attraction can go through months and months of closures.

And its a real shame actually because the heart and soul of this much-maligned attraction is one cemented in fun, pushing the boundaries, getting back to the real thrust of theme park attractions. Back in the 70’s on the funfair circuit, rides like the Enterprise, Magic Carpets and Swinging Pirate Ships were the bread and butter of the average fair. Even today they are along with log flumes, they are staple attractions at UK theme parks.  During the 90’s newer companies such as Mondial and KMG started to push funfair rides in far more thrilling attractions. The Top-Scan still to this day has the reputation as the most intense flat ride ever created whilst KMG refined the Move It, created the Tango and reimagined the Booster into a better and more reliable (read safer) attraction.

Rush, the more successful of the S&S Pair.

I feel that somewhere, sometimes in S&S head-offices when these crazy, off the wall concepts are created, people are to scared to say no. S&S, naturally have had successes. The screaming swing for example is a big hit and versions are to this day springing up all over the place and their shot towers are like a plague, they are everywhere. But it’s these other attractions such as the Sky-Swat and The Screaming Squirrel where someone should have put their foot down. The Screaming Squirrel is in three parks around the world all offering various levels of headache inducing inversions and air-time whilst the lowly Sky-Swat has attractions based in two places only. The ride is no longer offered to be manufactured; it is essentially a dead concept.

And this makes me glad Thorpe Park made the effort to get one back in 2004. Whilst the ride has had an unprecedent amount of closures from throwing its motor  at the queueline to numerous moments where the ride has been stuck at 60 feet in the air, there’s a perverse satisfaction in being able to get on the thing. These days, park enthusiasts take it for granted that an incredibly rare ride type is swinging away in a park, within a stones throw from the M25. In Pokemon terms its up there with Zapdos and Articuno. When you have Intamin launchers and ten looping rollercoasters so close, Slammer does get ignored. Positioned behind X:\ No Way Out and rarely actually moving, it can be mistaken for a stunt-show diving pole. It’s despite these flaws that Slammer is actually a bloody good ride. Full of impact, dread and geuine fear, its only true rival in the park is Detonator for in your face thrills.

Going over the top.

One can remember when it opened in 2005 and the amazing atmopshere that can only be there when you ride a freshly opened attraction. In those days there used to be heaps of staff at the ride, a white-board in which a pasty faced Staines local would direct you to a particular seat. A full queueline adding up to a 40 minute wait made sense back when it was a new attraction. These days, queues are created by a lack of staff, a lack of organization, a lack of care. This makes Slammer a poorly thought of attraction compared to its easier to run brothers.

In my head Slammer is under-rated. As a ride and as a concept. It harks back to the days when being held in your seat by g-force was the essence of the ride, not just a small bonus. Now-a-days, expectations are so high that a ride trying to do one simple thing just isn’t enough.

Slammer rises.