The manufacturer of the Fury 325 roller coaster is now on-site at Carowinds to help determine what caused one of the coaster’s support pillars to crack.
“We will continue to work closely with Carowinds to determine the cause, the repair and the reopening of the coaster,” Swiss coaster firm Bolliger & Mabillard said in a statement Tuesday to the Charlotte Observer. “Please rest assured that safety is our top priority.”
Inspectors from the North Carolina Department of Labor’s Elevator and Amusement Device Bureau were also on site Monday.
The coaster has been shut down since a large crack was discovered on Friday night. While the Charlotte park says that each ride is inspected daily, one guest, Tiffany Collins Newton, posted a photo showing a smaller crack in the same pillar on June 24 — six days before the ride was closed.
Jeremy Wagner, whose video of the larger crack led to the shutdown on Friday, told CNN that he was alarmed by the reaction of park staff. “Even after they had me AirDrop the video, the guest-services person walked off and said, ‘I’ll send this to somebody.’ And they just turned around and walked off, you know, nonchalant,” he said.
Fury 325 at Carowinds, has now been shut down thanks to a visitor who spotted this massive crack in the support beam. Huge shout out to Jeremy Wagner for getting the video and telling Carowinds about it. #wcnc pic.twitter.com/vqJU2J0upL
— Brad Panovich (@wxbrad) July 1, 2023
In a separate interview with The Washington Post, Wagner said he trusts engineers will address the causes of the crack and make Fury 325 safe to ride again.
“It might even be better, safer than it was before,” he said.
Fury 325 is the tallest coaster in the world with a lift hill, hitting a top speed of 95 miles per hour along its 6,602 feet of track. Every year since 2016, it has been voted the best steel roller coaster in Amusement Today magazine’s Golden Ticket Awards.