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Today I spent a half-day at Six Flags Astro World. It was the first time I had been there in years (and I really didn't have much desire to go today, but I have some family in town visiting and felt obligated to go with them.) On my last visit I remembered riding a great steel roller coaster called Taz's Texas Tornado. I was shocked and appalled to discover it was long gone, having seemingly vanished without a trace. My family thought I was crazy; they assured me it had never existed.
I found my vindication at a great site, CoasterGallery.Com. The site has pictures and descriptions of roller coasters at almost every major theme park. To my delight, I learned the following about Taz's Texas Tornado:
"Built by Schwarzkopf in 1986, Thriller (its original name before moving to Texas) traveled to many German carnivals. It ran at over 100 locations until finally settling down here as Taz's Texas Tornado in 1998. This was the coaster's 122nd assembly! The Taz portion of the name was dropped after its first season at AstroWorld."
"These loops are very circular as opposed to the loops on most other coasters. This makes for powerful G-forces on the riders."
"A few years ago, the original Tornado trains were modified by adding over-the-shoulder restraints. Because the 'horse collars' ratcheted down with the G-forces, riders found them extremely uncomfortable. In early 2001, new trains were delivered, but they had problems using the new cars on the track. Consequently, it never ran in 2001 or 2002 and was dismantled in late 2002. In May 2003, it opened at Six Flags Marine World as Zonga, the Swahili world for "coil" or "loop." "
"Texas Tornado is one of the largest coasters with a curved lift hill. It utilizes many tires powered by electric motors. The heat of Houston summers caused difficulties with the lift system, further aggravating the problems AstroWorld had keeping this coaster running."
"When I took this picture, AstroWorld was the only park in the world with three Schwarzkopf looping coasters. All of them can be seen in this picture."
"The fourth loop on the Tornado (shortest one shown here) is not quite a vertical loop, but has a little twist like a corkscrew loop."
It's a hell of a good site; go check it out.