Hyde Park Winter Wonderland Explained

Hyde Park Winter Wonderland
Frequency:Annually
Venue:Hyde Park, London
Location:London, United Kingdom
First:11 December 2007[1]
Founder Name:PWR Events[2]
Royal Parks of London
Attendance:2.5 million[3]
Status:Active

Hyde Park Winter Wonderland, commonly referred to as Winter Wonderland, is a large annual Christmas winter wonderland fair held in Hyde Park, London, from mid-November to early January. It features several festive markets, over 100 rides and attractions from across Europe, a Giant Wheel, numerous live shows, including a circus, ice show, and live music, as well as numerous bars and restaurants. In its first ten years, Winter Wonderland had 14 million visitors.[4]

History

Winter Wonderland began in 2005 as a small funfair operating through the Christmas period at the edge of Hyde Park. The lack of success led The Royal Parks to look at alternative events. In 2007, The Royal Parks invites AEG Live and PWR Events to co-operate on organising the new Winter Wonderland event. The event includes a Christmas Market, temporary Ice Rink, Giant Wheel, and a small selection of amusement rides along Serpentine Road in Hyde Park.

From 2009 to 2010, the event grew substantially, introducing the Bavarian Village (a German style food and drink centre), Zippo's Circus, Santa Land (an area with smaller rides for children and families), and the introduction of several larger rides, such as the Power Tower 2 freefall tower.

In 2012, the event was granted an expansion of the site. The following attractions were introduced: Wilde Maus XXL roller coaster; Magical Ice Kingdom (a walk-through exhibition of ice sculptures). The Bavarian Village expanded to include The Great Hall, an Oktoberfest style beer tent with live music.

In 2016, the attractions Munich Looping, the world's largest portable roller coaster; and the Imperial Ice Stars ice show were introduced.

In 2018, the following attractions were introduced: Dr ArchibaldMaster of Time dark ride, the Winter Wonderland Comedy Club,[5] The Snowman Experience,[6] and the Teletubbies Christmas Show.

On 2 September 2020, PWR Events announced that due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the event was cancelled, however, it returned on 19 November 2021.[7]

Attractions

Rides

Incidents

There is a high number of reported incidents at Hyde Park Winter Wonderland, despite it only being open for a small period of time each year.

On 24 November 2019, a professional acrobatic performer for Zippos Circus fell a reported 30ft after she slipped from her safety harness.[22] It was later disputed by circus management that she had only fallen 12ft.[23]

On 20 December 2021, a power cut caused the Munich Looping to come to a halt on the first hill, with riders having to exit the rollercoaster by walking down the trusses. No injuries were reported, although this specific ride was involved in the fatality of an employee while stationed at Vienna's Prater amusement park. The fatality was later deemed to be caused by the employee entering a restricted area.[24]

In the evening of the 11 December, 2022, a man was stabbed in the neck entering the premises, he was treated at hospital with non-life threatening injuries.[25]

On 15 December 2022, an incident occurred on the Slingshot ride. After a failure with the gearbox, the bungee cord appeared to fall loose, sending the passenger car into the support beam, there were no reported injuries.[26]

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Winter Wonderland: About Us. 2016-12-08.
  2. Web site: Hyde Park Winter Wonderland. 7 January 2019. 7 January 2019. https://web.archive.org/web/20190107032220/https://hydeparkwinterwonderland.com/. PWR Events, an International Management Group (UK) Limited company, are proud to be actively producing sustainable events and are certified to ISO 20121, the international standard for sustainability in event management..
  3. Web site: Winter Wonderland visitors rise to more than 2.5 million. 2016-12-08.
  4. Web site: Hyde Park Winter Wonderland. 2016-12-08. dead. https://web.archive.org/web/20161220192629/http://www.pwrevents.com/winterwonderland. 2016-12-20.
  5. Web site: Comedy Club Winter Wonderland 2019. Hyde Park Winter Wonderland.
  6. Web site: Rides and Games. Hyde Park Winter Wonderland.
  7. News: 2020-09-02. Winter Wonderland cancelled due to coronavirus. en-GB. BBC News. 2020-09-06.
  8. Web site: Ice Rink. 22 November 2019.
  9. Web site: Magical Ice Kingdom. 22 November 2019.
  10. Web site: Bavarian Village official website. 7 November 2017.
  11. Web site: Carousel Bar official site. 7 November 2017.
  12. Web site: Markets. 22 November 2019.
  13. Web site: Santa Land. 22 November 2019.
  14. Web site: Spectacular Shows. Hyde Park Winter Wonderland.
  15. Web site: Zippo's Christmas Circus. 22 November 2019.
  16. Web site: Cirque Berserk. 22 November 2019.
  17. Web site: Mellors Group - Giant Wheel. 7 November 2017.
  18. Web site: Wilde Maus XXL official site. 7 November 2017.
  19. Web site: Mellors Group - Ice Mountain. 7 November 2017.
  20. Web site: Mellors Group - Star Flyer. 7 November 2017.
  21. Web site: XXL - Manufacturer's description. 8 November 2017.
  22. Web site: Davidson . Tom . 2019-11-24 . Winter Wonderland acrobat in 'horrific' fall 30ft in front of shocked families . 2022-12-15 . mirror . en.
  23. Web site: Morrison . Jenny . Mills . Kelly-Ann . 2019-11-25 . Winter Wonderland acrobat injured in horror accident is mum devoted to circus . 2022-12-15 . mirror . en.
  24. Web site: red . wien ORF at/Agenturen . 2022-03-30 . Achterbahnunfall: Tote in Gefahrenbereich . 2022-12-15 . wien.ORF.at . de.
  25. Web site: Man 'stabbed in the neck' at Hyde Park's Winter Wonderland . 2022-12-16 . uk.news.yahoo.com . en-GB.
  26. News: 2022-12-15 . Two boys rescued from Winter Wonderland bungee ride . en-GB . BBC News . 2022-12-15.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Hyde Park Winter Wonderland".

Except where otherwise indicated, Everything.Explained.Today is © Copyright 2009-2024, A B Cryer, All Rights Reserved. Cookie policy.