Diggerland
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Diggerland is a the name of four theme parks in England based around the theme of diggers and JCBs. Diggerland is owned by the excavator hire firm H.E. Services.
Rides include a modified digger in which visitors sit in an adapted bucket and are spun around in the air. There are also opportunities to drive - and take full control of - many forms of diggers, and a four wheel drive and 3CX ride.
More particularly, these include different types of construction machinery including Dump Trucks, Mini JCB Diggers and Giant JCB Diggers (all under strict supervision). Attractions include rides, drives and static displays, along with play areas.
There are four parks which operate under the Diggerland name, in Kent, County Durham, Castleford, and Devon.
The fourth park opened in Yorkshire on the 6th of April 2007. The park is located at Whitwood near Castleford at Junction 31 of the M62.
The parks have 17 different rides, of which 14 are common to all four parks, with the rides requiring riders to be age 5 or over to drive (if the ride is a driving type), and either 2 or 3 years old to ride.
Diggerland Kent operates a distinct Snow Park in the winter months, featuring a main and teaching slope (for skiing and snowboarding), rope lift, snow play area, toboggan run and snow tube run. All snow is generated using a snow machine due to the lack of natural snowfall in Southern England.
Diggerland Durham is the smallest out of the four parks, the first park where accidents have occurred, and the first park to have been broken into.
[edit] Diggerland Durham Rampage
In 2007, former park marshal Chris Northorpe went on the rampage at DIGGERLAND in County Durham. The youth's usual actions were going into the secure compound, starting up one of the mechanical diggers, and driving it trough the attraction's gates. The youth also stole a JCB Forklift truck from H.E. Services and drove it trough a wall at Diggerland, before making off with an MP3 Player.
The youth also, on 3 separate occasions, drove a mechanical digger into the main reception destroying automatic doors, glass panels, and brickwork. Police contacted the youth, who admitted everything. He broke into the premises 7 times.
Northorpe caused at least £35,000 worth of damage. He had been out drinking with his family. Upon returning to Langley Park, he damaged a shop window before making his way to Diggerland. He entered the compound via a hole in a fence, before using his inside knowledge to obtain keys. The youth proceeded to drive the digger trough two sets of gates costing at least £2,500 each to replace. At this time the youth was still employed by the H.E. Group.
The youth then sent a text message to his employer explaining what he had done, bragging about how he had destroyed the park's gates.
Seven times the youth broke in: He drove through gates, drove into diggers, took out walls, drove a mechanical digger into the Diggerland shop, and crashed it into the Diggerland reception three times.
Northorpe appeared before Consett Youth Courts, and was given a twelve month driving ban and a twelve month referral order. You can watch the his rampage at the following link:
http://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/audiovideo/news/index.var.13084.0.0.php
