Puzzling historic coaster image on Europa Park website

[Squrmyweesl]

So this image is included at the top of Europa's 'History' page, with the caption 'Historie Achterbahn'. The text is ambiguous but all other photos in this section appear to be from Europa Park, where the first coaster was apparently built in 1984. This image looks much older than that. But where in the world ever had a Raptor-like historic single-rail coaster?

History and milestones | MACK Group

Learn more about the successful history of the MACK Group, which began in 1780 as a wagon-building workshop in Waldkirch.

corporate.europapark.com

My first thought was AI because it looks so anachronistic, but a reverse image search of the screenshot on TinEye says that this was first indexed on their 'Historie' page back in 2014. No results other than Europa came up. What on earth is this thing...?!

 

[roomraider]

That is a very complicated question one which I can't fully answer while sat in a train but it's true this is an early Mack. One of several similar coasters from that era.

If I remember correctly this one ended up at a Sportland pier in the USA as Meteor.



I believe it was a travelling ride and never opened at EP itself. It's believed that it is related to monorail eclaire (another travelling ride) in some way but I can't remember how, There's a great history post about the single rain coasters somewhere but I can't dig it up right now till I have some time.

 

[davidm]

https://www.reddit.com/r/rollercoasters/comments/4hsmik/early_mack_single_rail_from_1960s/

https://twitter.com/x/status/1397833717071106048

 

[Squrmyweesl]

Wow, that's so cool! I just found some references to early Mack coasters on Reddit threads but they didn't have photos or had been deleted.

Interestingly the Wikipedia page on single-rail coasters doesn't mention Mack at all, but it's not a very thorough article.

 

[roomraider]

Wow, that's so cool! I just found some references to early Mack coasters on Reddit threads but they didn't have photos or had been deleted.

Interestingly the Wikipedia page on single-rail coasters doesn't mention Mack at all, but it's not a very thorough article.

Here's the story I mentioned

Kermis Tilburg 2026 - de Tilburgse kermis | Monorail coasters – adding some rollercoaster history!

A quest to the source of modern tubular steel rollercoasters, which started not in Anaheim USA, but Paris France! Update 04/11/2022: rewritten a part of the ECLAIR/METEOR Update 14/13/2021: rewritten a part of the Dutch Monorail and updated the status of Ciclone in Brazil Introduction - how it...

www.kermistilburg.nl

It's an ongoing piece of research I've helped out with. So it's not all very clear at the moment.

It's believed there were at least 2 of these.

 

[Absimilliard]

Over at Nigloland in France, the Gelis family who owns the park used to be fairground ride operators and in the museum inside the park, you have this model. R2000 was an odd triangular shaped track coaster from Mack that appears to be the successor to Meteor.

 

[roomraider]

View attachment 39398

Over at Nigloland in France, the Gelis family who owns the park used to be fairground ride operators and in the museum inside the park, you have this model. R2000 was an odd triangular shaped track coaster from Mack that appears to be the successor to Meteor.

R2000 being if Mack origin is a common misconception. I believe it was built by GAM in northern Italy.

Mack built the 2 wooden single rail coasters. One which showman Tissot had GAM convert to steel and became monorail Eclaire which appeared at the Belgian Expo in the 60s and eventually the Texas State Fair as Flash, the second and smaller one ended up in the USA too at Sportland Pier.

 

[Squrmyweesl]

Here's the story I mentioned

Kermis Tilburg 2026 - de Tilburgse kermis | Monorail coasters – adding some rollercoaster history!

A quest to the source of modern tubular steel rollercoasters, which started not in Anaheim USA, but Paris France! Update 04/11/2022: rewritten a part of the ECLAIR/METEOR Update 14/13/2021: rewritten a part of the Dutch Monorail and updated the status of Ciclone in Brazil Introduction - how it...

www.kermistilburg.nl

It's an ongoing piece of research I've helped out with. So it's not all very clear at the moment.

It's believed there were at least 2 of these.

Really interesting stuff - hard to believe that the Meteor track was wooden, that's some wild carpentry!