Hey guys, I went to the park today. They were running one SOB train thru the course countless number of times today, with the water dummies. I wonder what they are up too? I'm sure it has to with the investagation. They must have already repaired the broken timber? Here are a few shots I got, enjoy!

We saw it working today too. The damaged parts are all rebuilt and working 100%. You may have some SoB in your FearFest lineup this year.

That would be awesome if it opens by Fearfest. I wonder if that's what they are trying to do? I wondered that myself today.

I hope it does, SOB is honestly one of my favorite coasters.

Hmmm I just noticed something in my pics. Look at the first one. It looks as if the side of the car in certain seats have been removed. You can see it in the first and third car. I wonder what that is?

My guess is that those were removed to allow some sort of instrumentation to be mounted to the train.

That does make since. It looks as if PKI and Cedar Fair are trying hard to get SOB back on his feet.

You know if Kings Island would let us PKI Central folks know when they were planning to reopen the Son of Beast, I would venture to say alot of us would go to show support for our beloved freind. Maybe a Fall meet, greet and support!!

Hope is restored! SOB is showing life. First FoF at KD opens and now this, a most wonderful day!

You know if Kings Island let us PKI Central folks know when they were planning to reopen the Son of Beast, I would venture to say alot of us would go to show support for our beloved freind. Maybe a Fall meet, greet and support!!

Heck yeah I know I would. I can't wait to ride SOB again. But how ever long it takes I'll wait.

I saw the trains run through several times empty Thursday afternoon. Now the water dummies. Now, we can't conclude yet that they are definitely reopening SOB this season, because they are simply running tests as requested by the Dept. or Agriculture.

Is someone mad^ because they not tearing it down im gona go wait on the first day! It opens!

Just seeing the coaster run brings relief in my mind. I am happy just to see the coaster show life.

Well keep in mind they had to run it for the investigation. Regardless of whether or not the ride ever reopens - the state was requring those parts of the ride to be rebuilt (under supervision) and the ride to be tested. Once testing is over the state can decide whether or not it is safe, the insurance companies can decide whether or not it is insurable, and Cedar Fair can decide whether or not to open it. I think it would reopen if they got green lights from both the insurance companies and the state.

I certainly hope Son of Beast reopens. It is such an awesome ride - and I find Kings Island quite lacking without it...

But will the genral public ride it? The ride will probably have low ridership now because of the accident. People aren't wanting to ride it because they think that they'll get hurt too. Look at FoF, before the modifications from OTSR to lapbars it had low ridership.

To me Ceadr Fair has 2 options for this ride:

1. Modify the whole ride to make it enjoyable-ex. Intamin's prefabricated track and better trains

2. Tear it down and build a more reliable coaster-B&M, Chance-Morgan Manufacturing, or Intamin hyper coasters

^That actually brings to mind something I read a little while back. It basically stated that if there was a ride that you could design where 1 in a 1,000,000 would be injured the number of riders would increase. I may have read that here or somewhere else. Lots of the GP seems to ride rides with that fear of how tall or fast a coaster is. If you throw in the fact that the ride had a malfunction recently it adds to that fear. Now I don't know if that is all true or not but I honestly could see people riding SOB just to say they rode the ride that broke.

No one honestly believes SOB is going to open to the public again do they?

Please tell me that people can't possibly imagine that?

Apparently some here mistake testing for an investigation with testing for a reopening. They are not necessarily, and in this case, almost certainly are NOT, the same.

Well if its only testing for the investigation then Kings Island and the state of Ohio should be made aware that there is some guests that would be willing to ride the Son of Beast and not hold them responsible, if anything should go wrong. That way they could do a more thorough and complete realistic investigation.

I am not one of those guest.

The park would never be able to put a guest in that type of situation.

Even if a guest signed a release form it could be argued and dismissed if something of a serious nature happened.

ie- the guest did not fully understand what could possibly happen

If you honestly think that legal coucil is going to allow SOB to operate this year or quite possibly every again; you don't understand the nature of the situation that the park finds itself in.

I'm glad that they are at least testing it.

The way I see it is that it may still be in the hospital, but it has regained conceissnes, and getting ready to go back to its normal life, hear screams of terror, and feel wheels massaging him at great speeds, and give everyone a picture of themselves.

haha I love imagery

yay!!! im so happy its up and actually running.

hope they reopen it really soon so i can ride it!

From the look of those boxes on the sides in one picture they are testing the design of the ride to make sure its safe to let people back on. After they test the ride the state will tell KI what they have to fix to reopen the coaster again. If things are not that bad SOB might be open during Fear Fest but don't hope for it.

UMM ^ they already fix it....you can see the new wood in the pictures.

UMM ^ they already fix it....you can see the new wood in the pictures.

I believe that new wood you can see in the pics was from the off season when they did alot of work to SOB.

UMM ^ they already fix it....you can see the new wood in the pictures.

I believe that new wood you can see in the pics was from the off season when they did alot of work to SOB.

He is right the new wood is from when they opened this season. If you rode this season you could see alot of new wood all over the coaster. I do wonder if the trains will change after all of the testing so no one could like the one lady did. I bet their are alot more people at the park that know more but can not say anything to the public right now.

Edited August 19, 200620 yr by Vortex

I hope the new seats have more leg room.. I don't know what it is but SoB is the only coaster my legs arn't comfortable on.. am I the only one? jw

If you honestly think that legal coucil is going to allow SOB to operate this year or quite possibly every again; you don't understand the nature of the situation that the park finds itself in.

I don't necessarily disagree with you, but why are you so certain of this? Rides that people have been injured and even died on have reopened before. Two Beast trains collided five years ago, sending people to the hospital, and it reopened.

...and got a totally different braking system because of it. . .

I belive a Drop Zone had a death on it and all 5 reopened.