Lost Coaster of Superstition Mountain
Specific Type: Wooden, Enclosed
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Indiana Beach park of Monticello, Indiana decided to add a new attraction to the family-operated amusement park in 1978 for the park's 55th operating season. Tom Spackman, son of park founder Earl Spackman designed the layout for a small motor-driven 'mine car' ride in which passengers would slowly travel through and around an artificial mountain-like building structure. The family-geared ride, named 'Superstition Mountain', opened and became a favorite among Indiana Beach's guests. Over the years that followed, the Spackman family packed the park with new rides including two Custom Coasters Inc. wooden coasters - the out & back Hoosier Hurricane and familyCornball Express. And as the coaster structures and flat rides continued to dominate over the park, Superstition Mountain became more and more unnoticed with each passing season. But 2002 is the year that Superstition Mountain has made a comeback to the ride scene. Custom Coasters returned once more to Indiana Beach to completely rework the Mountain and convert the motor-driven car ride into a grivity-driven wooden rollercoaster. Retaining and extending the original horizontal track plan and adding on a whole new level of vertical thrills, CCI has credted a truely one-of-a-kind 1,400-foot-long ride experience packed with new hills, dips and banked curves. The Lost Coaster of Superstition Mountain debuted on June 8th, 2002 as Indiana Beach's fifth and most unique coaster. Aside from the coaster's unique history, the Lost Coaster separates itself from the rest with a first 'elevator' lift in place of the traditional lift hill to crank the cars up vertically to start off the ride. Also unique are the ride's vehicles: face-to-face seating coaches arranged two cars to a train, the first such arrangement to be used on a wooden coaster since being brought about by the now-defunct Comet at Crystal Beach Park in 1948.
After the two cars are loaded forwards and backwards into the Lost Coaster's vehicles, the ride commences with a 90-degree right-hand bend from the loading area. The cars move into the shaft of the elevator lift area and then the trip upwards begins. After achieving top three-and-a-half story heights, the lift slows and lets the train out, right into a dip down and steep banked dive around the back side of the mountain. The duo of cars rises and then plows into a sharp L-curve to the left sending the ride diving down the first major drop of the coaster. After quickly leveling, the track snaps back up into a series of two hills meandering around to the right, left and right, then around a 180-degree banked turnaround built over Indiana Beach's antique car ride and over the waters of Lake Shafer below. Next is a series of three more small hops leading back to the mountain before the track enters the building for the first time. The Lost Coaster navigates through Superstition Mountain in darkness, winding around and then climbing up into a section of mid-course block brakes. It's back down again and through a duo of drops and then a curve leading back out of the enclosure and hugging the mountain as riders bank to the left. Passengers are swept back into the building briefly to complete a right hand curve and dive before re-emerging once more to climb up into a hairpin U-turn. The ride dives down into Superstition Mountain once again and through a spinning tunnel retained from the former ride to gear up for the course's finale. For the final run through the mountain, the layout veers through a trick-track-like zig-zag to the right, left, right, left, and back out of the mountain, the cars being moved around a final U-turn back into the station. |
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