Phantom Fantasia


Phantom Fantasia, later renamed Wicked Witches Haunt, was a dark ride opened in 1983 at Thorpe Park in Surrey, England. It took riders through a series of large animated horror scenes and illusions. The ride was designed by British attraction studio Sparks and the endless transit system manufactured by Mack Rides in Germany. The ride was refurbished with a UV treatment in 1994, renamed 'Wicked Witches Haunt'. It was demolished following a fire in 2000.

History

Phantom Fantasia was opened in 1983 as part of the Central Park area, Thorpe Park's first large development into a theme park. It was produced by Sparks in Colchester. The ride featured many animated characters, including a hunchback swinging from a bone chandelier, a torture chamber, a ghoulish seance with a levitating table, Henry VIII dining at his banquet table while ghosts of his six wives appear and disappear around him, a crypt, a Victorian street scene featuring Sweeney Todd and Mrs Lovett's shop windows, a black magic alchemist/necromancer brewing a potion, two witches around a cauldron in their cave, Mary Queen of Scots holding her severed head in her arms, and a ballroom of eighteenth-century-costumed waltzing skeletons.
The ride was refurbished as Wicked Witches Haunt in 1994 with a scenic overhaul in UV. A number of witch animatronic figures added, a new soundtrack and a new final scene in a cobweb-filled dungeon. On-ride photography was also added
The attraction was destroyed by a large fire in 2000, the cause of which was never publicly announced.