At Alton Towers, I've been stuck on the Air lift hill and brake run for about 5-10 minutes. Both times for phones.

I got stuck on Oblivions lift hill because someone on our car had their phone out.

The best one so far was getting stuck on Thirteen right at the end, we came out of the tunnel section and got stuck where the track switches. They sent out a member of staff who was really fun. I remember him saying something like "does anyone need the toilet?" and a girl put her hand up and he said "I hope you have a strong bladder" to which everyone laughed apart from the girl.

He just made small talk with everyone until the ride was running again. I assume it would be much worse to be stuck on the indoor section.


The worst, and most dangerous situation I have been in on a ride was on one of these

I had been on the ride a million times, but once, when I was about 8 or 9, I went on with someone and the safety bar came fully undone...Now, its not the type of ride you would fly out of, but because I was quite small, I was moving about a lot, and I felt very unsafe at the time. It really shook me up and it took me years to get back on that ride.

Thirteen_ first time on it and it stopped inside. Lights came on and a member of staff came out to let us know what was happening. We were only stuck for a minute or 2 but we were disappointed as being the first time on it and having it lit up ruined it for us. We were given the choice to stay seated at the end of the ride and have another go though, got the moaners going however as the queue had been rather long that day

Never happened to me at Alton Towers, I’ve only been in the queue for Smiler, Air and Thirteen when the ride broke.

I was on the log flume at American Adventure when that broke down. Luckily we had just come down the biggest drop otherwise we would have been stuck at the top.

I've had 2 breakdowns both in AT one 3/4 up oblivions hill because someone started filming on their phone. The other in one of the final sections in duel when you pass under the catwalk. Stopped for about 2 minutes and kept shooting then floodlights came on and we had to walk a bit back through it with an op, was really cool to see like that.

We were loaded on to Oblivion, staff restraint-checked and were all clear for dispatch however we couldn’t move forward. 15 minutes later we were told to get off and wait at the exit while they tested before then being told to board the ride again. It probably didn’t help that the temperature was 30 degrees, so staff were chucking water on the people stacked on the break run.

I had a brilliant breakdown on Thi3teen just after the freefall drop.I love that dark room and when the emergency lights came on I got to have a proper look at all the theming. People were genuinely terrified that another train was going to land on top of us, haha!

The Smiler. Broke down on the brake run a couple of weeks ago, The ride staff had to come out and release the restraints manually with a plug in contraption for the car in front. We were there for about ten minutes, and the ride started up again and we proceeded to the station

Oblivion, on Sunday. Was stuck for an hour in the heat, got sun burn and felt a bit woozy, but we got given water. It took the staff a long time to put up all the temporary guard rails so we could evacuate safely. 

I once had a rollback on the Mine Train (coming out of the tunnel, going up the hill past the rapids). It took a good 10 minutes (and multiple attempts of rocking us back and forth), to build up enough speed to finally get us over the top.

Once got stuck on duel, so much mixed feelings

At AT, apart from the usual SkyRide stoppage, I got stopped on Duel for like 10 minutes right next to a speaker.

This isn't AT but I also broke down on the Colossus brake run for 10 minutes in a heatwave.

In the brake run tunnel for Wicker Man for about 20 minutes. Got a free priority pass out of it though!!

jackf1tz wrote:

In the brake run tunnel for Wicker Man for about 20 minutes. Got a free priority pass out of it though!!

We had the same. They turned the lights on too

That also happened to Stan and me, they had to have engineers move the train in front of us. That suggests it was a possible parking issue.

Yeah, this was within the first few weeks of it opening

It happened to us during school season, shows that it is still an issue, but something that is occurring less and less as the season progresses.

Smiler313 wrote:

That also happened to Stan and me, they had to have engineers move the train in front of us. That suggests it was a possible parking issue.

What a great experience that was! ! I have also had that issue but towards the beginning of the breakrun (not even in the tunnel) as well, not sure what the issue was - however the ride was down for the rest of the day and I got to walk through the tunnel with the lights on. 

Well at Alton Towers I can't remember a ride ever actually breaking down while I've been on it. Most is just say a 5 minute stop at the end or in the station before the announcement of 'Do not take phones, cameras, or loose objects' on the ride is played and operations return. Did have to wait for around 20 mins in the Wicker Man station with the 'we have ceased our ritual' announcement playing every 2 minutes or so

Actual break downs though. the only one I can think of is when I was around 12 I would say, I was on Le Défi de César at Parc Asterix. If you don't know it, its a Madhouse attraction. Well it completed its cycle with no issues, except that the drum finished upside down and the doors of it were at the top, thus inaccessible. I kinda had a panic attack during this, so I don't know how long we were sat there, but it must've been over 15 minutes, with only a brief announcement which understandably was entirely in French, however no one I was with is fluent so we had to just sit there. Eventually they got it started again and we went through the ride's cycle successfully and then could leave the ride

Bexa wrote:

Well at Alton Towers I can't remember a ride ever actually breaking down while I've been on it. Most is just say a 5 minute stop at the end or in the station before the announcement of 'Do not take phones, cameras, or loose objects' on the ride is played and operations return. Did have to wait for around 20 mins in the Wicker Man station with the 'we have ceased our ritual' announcement playing every 2 minutes or so

Actual break downs though. the only one I can think of is when I was around 12 I would say, I was on Le Défi de César at Parc Asterix. If you don't know it, its a Madhouse attraction. Well it completed its cycle with no issues, except that the drum finished upside down and the doors of it were at the top, thus inaccessible. I kinda had a panic attack during this, so I don't know how long we were sat there, but it must've been over 15 minutes, with only a brief announcement which understandably was entirely in French, however no one I was with is fluent so we had to just sit there. Eventually they got it started again and we went through the ride's cycle successfully and then could leave the ride

kind of ruins the illusion of being upside down if you sit 'upside down' for 15 minutes without falling

I've witnessed Helix go back down the second launch, been stopped on Balder, Nemesis, Oblivion for cameras and been in two boat jams.