There are plenty of ways to ride Stealth.
But riding it repeatedly as the sun goes down, watching Amity disappear into darkness before launching from 0 to 80mph in 1.8 seconds? That’s something else entirely.
Theme Park Daily was at Thorpe Park last night for a special Extended Ride Time (ERT) event celebrating Stealth’s 20th anniversary, and it turned out to be a brilliant evening for fans of one of the UK’s most iconic coasters.
The event brought together a decent crowd of thoosies, content creators and, thankfully, plenty of hardcore, merched-out Stealth fans, making for a fantastic atmosphere. The carriage and the queue line was full of theme parks fans having a good time and it made the whole night a lot of fun.
And it was brilliant to meet so many Theme Park Daily readers in person too. A massive shout-out to CJ&Pops, Hyperia Glazer and everyone else who came over to say hello.
Stealth from sunset to darkness
The big attraction of the evening was, obviously, the ride time.
Stealth was kept running beyond normal daytime hours, allowing anyone lucky enough to have a ticket to experience the 205-foot top hat in completely different conditions — from daylight, through sunset and eventually into the darkness.
And Stealth looks absolutely incredible at night.
The famous top hat dominates the Amity skyline by day, but once the light disappears, the experience changes completely. The launch feels even more dramatic as the train blasts out of the station before shooting vertically towards the top of the 62.5-metre structure.
One for the collectors
For the truest hardcore Stealth fan, there was another rather unusual piece of memorabilia fans could enter a raffle to be eligible to buy — a section of Stealth’s launch cable mounted as a collector’s display piece.
Definitely one for the Stealth superfan’s collection.
The Theme Park Daily team was too busy lapping as many time as possible to get involved , but we came home with some cool new Stealth merchandise all the same.
Shout-out to the ride ops
The operations were fantastic throughout the event, with two trains kept moving at a seriously impressive pace.
Stealth is a high-adrenaline ride with a short duration and always leaves you wanting another go. The hard work of the Thorpe Park team helped make sure the night was a success.
20 years of Stealth
Stealth opened at Thorpe Park on 15 March 2006, becoming one of the park’s defining attractions.
Built by Intamin and themed around 1950s American drag racing, the Accelerator Coaster originally arrived as Europe’s tallest and fastest launch coaster.
Twenty years later, Hyperia has taken the records at Thorpe Park, but Stealth still has a completely different character.
There is something timeless about standing underneath that enormous top hat, hearing the countdown and knowing exactly what is about to happen.
Stealth by day or Stealth at night?
After last night’s ERT, we’re definitely going with night rides. Catching a glimpse of Hyperia and the rest of Thorpe Park lit up in the darkness just before hurtling back down the top hat was fantastic.
Huge credit to Thorpe Park for putting on a brilliant evening — and to everyone who came along and helped make it such a great atmosphere.
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