Monday, June 11, 2007

Not going anywhere for a while...


Grab A Snickers!

Remember those old Snickers commercials, where the person was placed in a precarious position, like hanging in a bear trap and was basically stuck and the voice over announcer would say: "Not going anywhere for a while...grab a Snickers".

Well I'm sure the riders stuck upside down on the X-Coaster on Saturday won't appreciate my humor and rightly so. Could you imagine the blood flowing to your head for 30 straight minutes? I'm just surprised no one passed out while stuck upside down on the ride!

Just looking at this coaster would make me think twice about going on it.


The X-Coaster at Magic Springs

Doesn't exactly look like the world's safest ride does it? According to the theme park's website The X-Coaster "shoots riders 150 feet in the air, flips them upside down and then sends everyone on a 360-degree corkscrew roll at more than 65 miles an hour."

Nice. Sounds innocent enough. Especially during power outages.

This description of the coaster came from one of the park's spokesman (courtesy of the Arkansas Times):

---
"This exciting new ride treats our guests to an upside down inversion at 150 feet, the highest in the world. What makes the ride unique is that a technological innovation leaves the riders inverted 150 feet above the ground without shoulder restraints.

When the riders leave the loading platform, they are taken for a vertical ascent of 150 feet, at which point the car performs a thrillingly slow quarter-loop backwards, which has the riders hanging upside-down. Then the riders are sent on a 360-degree corkscrew roll, followed by a plummeting vertical drop at more than 65 miles an hour.

At this point it appears that the riders will return to the starting station, but instead they rocket past the station, stop on the lift hill, drop backwards through the station at high speed, stop upside down and rocket forward through the station again.”



---

Nice. I'm sure the riders who were "inverted 150 feet above the ground without shoulder restraints" appreciated feeling helpless when they were left upside down for 30 minutes. Nothing like hanging upside down by the thread of a lap belt for thirty minutes to make you feel "exhiliarated!"

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

no way...i'd scream bloody hell if i was trapped on that ride!