TH13TEEN: How Alton Towers Kept a World First Secret for Two Years

TH13TEEN: How Alton Towers Kept a World First Secret for Two Years

TH13TEEN: How Alton Towers Kept a World First Secret for Two Years

For two years, Alton Towers built a rollercoaster in plain sight and refused to say what it did.

Fences went up. Teaser images appeared with the crucial element hidden behind banners. Marketing campaigns ran without naming the ride. And the secret held — genuinely held — until three days before opening.

Here's the story of TH13TEEN, and why the trick still works.

The Stats

| | | |---|---| | Opened | 20 March 2010 | | Codename | Secret Weapon 6 | | Manufacturer | Intamin | | Cost | £15 million | | Height | 20m | | Drop | 18m | | Length | 760m | | Top speed | 42mph | | Inversions | 0 | | G-force | 3.2 | | Duration | 1 min 40 | | Capacity | 1,100 riders per hour | | Height restriction | 1.2m – 1.96m | | Location | Dark Forest | | Slogan | *"If you go down to the woods today, you better not go alone."* |

It Stands Where the Corkscrew Stood

TH13TEEN occupies the exact site of the Corkscrew, Alton Towers' first rollercoaster, which ran for 28 years from 1980 to 2008 and is covered in detail elsewhere on this site.

The station — themed as a decaying crypt — sits directly where the Corkscrew once stood.

Replacing the ride that created the modern Alton Towers was a genuine statement of intent. It also transformed Ug Land into Dark Forest, with Rita losing her "Queen of Speed" title in the same rebrand.

The Secret

Alton Towers announced SW6 in late 2008. All anyone knew was that it would feature a "world's first" element.

Then they built it in public for two years and said nothing.

Throughout the 2009–10 closed season, construction photos were posted — including teaser images that supposedly showed the secret element, hidden underneath banners stating the Secret Weapon was inside.

The slogans got progressively more cryptic. A banner reading "Ride into the Unknown". Campaigns inviting people to "Ride the Demon of the Dark Forest" and "Surrender in March 2010". None named the ride.

Press material called it a "psychoaster", promising psychological fear rather than physical thrills.

Speculation ran constantly across enthusiast forums for two years. Nobody got it.

The marketing team, led by Morwenna Angove, held the line until 17 March 2010 — three days before opening — when it was finally revealed on GMTV as the world's first freefall drop rollercoaster.

What Actually Happens

The ride begins conventionally enough. A drive-tyre lift hill, then a 20-metre drop twisting between the trees, high-speed turns through the forest.

Then you enter the crypt — a dark, indoor show building — and stop.

A brief tease: a three-foot drop. Enough to make you think that was it.

Then, after a pause of around two seconds, the track itself freefalls approximately five metres in darkness, taking the train with it.

A wraith figure illuminates in front of the train. An air blaster fires. And the carriage is propelled backwards out of the crypt, into a disorienting reverse helix, before emerging and being pushed forward into the station.

Why the Track Falling Is Genuinely Clever

Most drop elements drop the *train*. TH13TEEN drops the track and the train together.

That's a substantially harder engineering problem, and it's why the ride took two years to develop.

Magnetic brakes control the freefall. And the solution to the strain it placed on the hydraulics was counterintuitive: use a lightweight family coaster train.

John Wardley — Ride Consultant for Merlin and profiled elsewhere on this site — explained after opening that Intamin's family coaster trains were chosen specifically because their low weight reduced strain on the hydraulics operating the drop.

That's why TH13TEEN doesn't feel like a thrill coaster in its outdoor sections. It genuinely isn't one. The gentle layout is a consequence of the drop element, not a design compromise.

The Theme

The "bad luck" concept and Dark Forest theme were designed by Candy Holland, Art Director for Merlin Entertainments — who also worked with Wardley on The Smiler.

Thirteen as an unlucky number, witchcraft folklore, and a decaying crypt in a forest that shouldn't be entered alone. The slogan borrows directly from *The Teddy Bears' Picnic* — a detail that later fed into the Dark Hollow scare zone, covered elsewhere on this site.

Is It Actually Scary?

It depends entirely on whether you know what's coming.

First ride, no knowledge: genuinely unsettling. The stop, the tease, the pause, then the floor falling away in darkness.

Knowing the secret: considerably less so, but the freefall still lands physically.

At 1.2m minimum, it's one of the more accessible thrill rides at the park — a genuine stepping stone between the family coasters and Nemesis or Oblivion.

If you're taking a nervous child: the outdoor sections are gentle. The crypt sequence is the entire scare, and it's brief.

Practical Tips

Height: 1.2m minimum, 1.96m maximum.

Single rider queue available.

Fastrack available.

Don't spoil it for a first-timer. The surprise is the ride.

Back row for the strongest sensation in the backwards helix.

Ride in the evening for the fullest atmospheric effect in the Dark Forest.

The Verdict

TH13TEEN gets dismissed by enthusiasts as too tame, and the outdoor layout genuinely is mild.

But it's one of the few rides anywhere that's built entirely around a single idea, executed as a genuine world first, and marketed with enough discipline to protect the surprise for two years.

Fifteen years on, nobody else has copied it.