USA TODAY International Edition
Theme park rides go to extremes
Thrill attractions will make your stomach drop
It just wouldn’t be a day at the park — the amusement park, that is — without a hearty chorus of screams. Parks have long appealed to our innate, cathartic desire to get our pulses racing and our adrenaline pumping. To better help us confront and conquer our fears, they’ve upped the ante lately with taller, faster, and more devilish contraptions (note: roller coasters will be covered in a future installment).
10 Texas SkyScreamer at Six Flags Over Texas in Arlington and New England SkyScreamer at Six Flags New England in Agawam, Mass.
Many things can trigger anxiety, including extreme heights. At 400 feet tall, both of Six Flags’ SkyScreamer rides are pretty extreme. In fact, they share recognition from Guinness World Records as the world’s tallest swing carousel rides. If they remained closer to the ground, they wouldn’t be nearly as thrilling. But spinning around at 35 mph where the air is rare on skimpy seats is plenty unnerving.
9 Giant Canyon Swing at Glenwood Caverns Adventure Park in Glenwood Springs, Colo.
A pendulum ride, the Giant Canyon Swing moves four passengers back and forth, takes them nearly vertical at the height of each swinging arc, hits a top speed of 50 mph, and delivers potent, tummy-tickling, negative G-forces. But what distinguishes this screamer from similar rides is that it is perched at the edge of a cliff on top of a mountain and swings out 1,300 feet above the Colorado River into a canyon.
8 Ko’okiri Body Plunge and Kala & Tai Nui Serpentine Body Slides at Volcano Bay in Universal Orlando, Fla., Summit Plummet at Blizzard Beach in Walt Disney World, Lake Buena Vista, Fla., and Deep Water Dive at Kentucky Kingdom in Louisville
Florida’s mega-parks are better known for their princesses and wizards than for white-knuckle rides. But at 125 feet, Ko’okiri Body Plunge at Universal’s Volcano Bay is the country’s tallest speed slide. Sliders get into a launch capsule and are released into a 70-degree plunge in the dark. Volcano Bay’s two Serpentine Body Slides also start at 125 feet and use launch capsules, but they take a more winding route.
Not all that long ago, the Summit Plummet at Disney World took the honors, at 120 feet, as the tallest water slide in the USA. It is so crazy, riders don’t make contact with the precariously steep flume for a split second. Deep Water Dive opened in 2014 at Kentucky Kingdom. It sends riders careening down 121 feet.
7 Insanity at Stratosphere Tower in Las Vegas
Passengers spin around on this centrifuge-like ride and experience 3 Gs of force as their vehicles pivot out at 70 degrees. It is one a few rides that sit at the top of the nearly 900-foot Stratosphere Tower. When the arm that holds the vehicles swings away from the tower, riders have an, um, insane 90-story-high view of the Las Vegas Strip below.
6 X-Scream at Stratosphere Tower in Las Vegas
Passengers board X-Scream’s coaster-like vehicle some 900 feet in the air. When the ride starts, a short piece of track tilts downward toward the edge of the tower. Riders race headlong toward the Strip until magnetic brakes kick in at the last second.
5 Falcon’s Fury at Busch Gardens Tampa
Like other drop-tower rides, Falcon’s Fury climbs high into the air — in this case a knee-knocking 300 feet. What makes this ride unique is that before it drops, its seats pivot 90 degrees so that passengers face the ground as they freefall at 60 mph.
4 Lex Luthor: Drop of Doom at Six Flags Magic Mountain in Valencia, Calif., and Zumanjaro Drop of Doom at Six Flags Great Adventure in Jackson, N.J.
Like Falcon’s Fury, both of these Six Flags rides are drop towers. But they are bolted onto insanely tall coaster towers and slowly lift passengers more than 100 feet higher than the Busch Gardens ride. Riders stew in open seats more than 400 feet in the air before dropping to their doom at a gut-wrenching 90 mph.
3 SkyCoaster at Fun Spot America in Kissimmee, Fla.
Many parks have SkyCoasters. One to three riders get hoisted to the top of an A-frame tower. They pull a release, freefall down, and swing to and fro. At a mindnumbing 300 feet, the Fun Spot America SkyCoaster is the world’s tallest.
2 Slingshot at Magical Midway in Orlando
Passengers sit in a vehicle tethered to two towers before being catapulted into the air. Slingshot is the world’s largest and soars nearly 400 feet skyward at up to 90 mph while delivering up to 5 Gs.
1 SkyJump at Stratosphere Tower in Las Vegas
SkyJump passengers get the ultimate thrill by starting at the top of the Vegas tower, jumping off, and landing on the ground. Riders in jump suits are attached to cables for a “controlled freefall” 855 feet to the Vegas Strip.