Six Flags Great Adventure Music Video

As a final closure to the Six Flags Great Adventure Rollercoaster Introduction series that ended last Friday, and as a continuation to the music video streak started with Batman & Robin: The Chiller, I’m posting this great music video I found. It’s got lots of really nice footage of the rides, shows and most rollercoaster in the park set to “Emergency” by Paramore. At the bottom is also a playlist of all the videos featured in this series and above a nice panorama view of the park, which can be found in its original huge state here. Enjoy =), and I’ll see you guys again some other time.

Six Flags Great Adventure Rollercoaster Introduction: Bonus

The next and last rollercoaster in this series is a yet another super-hero themed and a very unique one called Batman & Robin: The Chiller. Unfortunately it was closed last year due to consistent problems, and was replaced by The Dark Knight Coaster introduced last time. Build is 1997 Batman & Robin: The Chiller was the first ever dueling LIM (Linear Induction Motor) launched lopping rollercoaster, but it suffered various technical problems from the start and was therefore closed for most of its opening season. Those problems didn’t however keep this crazy awesome coaster from gaining big popularity among coaster enthusiasts, and earning a permanent place in their and even many ordinary park goers’ hearts. I myself am absolutely certain that I would have enjoyed this ride much more than its successor The Dark Knight Coaster, and am quite sad of its demolishing. Therefore instead of the usual wind gushing on-ride video, I’m blogging a rather emotional music video (embedded below), which consists of still photos, and both on-ride and off-ride video footage. I do however hope that the semi similar rivalry between the movies of the same name ends up with The Dark Knight getting a massive victory over Batman & Robin dubbed the worst Batman movie ever.

Batman & Robin: The Chiller is - or rather was a launched dueling coaster, where both tracks, named Batman and Robin of course, went through slightly different inversions, up a hill and back the same route to the station. Since the LIM’s used up so much energy, simultaneous launches became impossible quickly after the grand opening, and since the ride has often operated with only one train running, usually Robin which was more reliable. Both trains were accelerated to 70 miles per hour using the LIM, and then used to speed to negotiate a vertical slope. Then Robin went through a cobra roll, while Batman did a top hat inversion ending up side by side facing the direction they came from. Both tracks did a zero-g roll and went up the final spike, which had another set if LIM’s at the top. These LIM’s gave the trains the necessary speed to go backwards through the same inversions and reach the station. Both zero-g rolls were removed early last year, since whenever the spike LIM’s failed, it was quite likely that the train would stall. Batman swept through the 1137 feet of track and 140 foot drop in 32 seconds, while Robin used 48 seconds to navigate a 105 foot drop and 1229 feet of track.

Six Flags Great Adventure Rollercoaster Introduction: Part 13

It seems like a good idea to give up hope on someone posting a proper on-ride video of the parks newest rollercoaster The Dark Knight Coaster so soon after its opening, so this and an upcoming bonus introduction won’t get delayed any further. Luckily I have found a few videos in which the whole ride is photographed with a backward facing camera provided by the park. In my opinion the best of those can be found here and embedded below. You should also check out this official promotion video, since it has footage of the ride’s Dark Knight movie themeing and queue area. So the Dark Knight Coaster is the park’s newest ride and it opened just three weeks ago. As you can see from the video, it’s an enclosed ride with cars that look like Gotham City Rail cars. This Wild Mouse rollercoaster travels the 1213 feet long twisting and turning steel track full of sudden drops and unbaked sharp turns, with a maximum height of 45 feet, in two minutes and reaches a top speed of 30 miles per hour. So the ride will definitely be wild even though the stats are nothing compared to the big rollercoasters.

The ride and especially the queue area are heavily themed with props and effects from the movie and Batman’s hometown. Things like a TV screen, where you can see yourself and your friends wearing Joker masks, entertain the guests as they wait in line. The Joker can also be seen during the ride in several hallucinations and even lurking in the structures of the ride. This notorious jokester also wreaks havoc in a several minute long pre-show presentation, which gives some insight in to the movie premiering this July. The general consensus of the Dark Knight Coaster seems to be disappointment in its shortness and lack of intensity, but I believe it will be a fun and surprising experience, when you don’t expect it to feature massive high speed drops or inversions, but instead unseen drops and turns, the excitement of darkness, and a strong versatile themeing. I have yet to find a proper or good sized picture from inside the ride, and have to settle for a medium sized outdoor photo (above), but several small sized construction photos are available, and also a video, which features some on-ride footage too.

Six Flags Great Adventure Rollercoaster Introduction: Part 12

Once again next up is one of the slower rollercoaster of the park… Or actually the slowest of them all. Built in 1999, Road Runner Railway is a slow family coaster designed mostly for children, so adults are not allowed to ride unless they’re accompanied by a child less than 54 inches tall. So if I or any of my friends want to ride it, we’ll have to lure a shorty to accompany us, perhaps with some treats :D! The end result will probably lead to the park jail for at least questioning, so I don’t recommend it unless one of us wants to get to know the US justice system up close and personal :D!

Road Runner Railway is such a low intensity ride, that info on its top speed isn’t available, but fortunately some other statistics can be found. It has the shortest train of all the rollercoasters in the park with only six cars. The train rises up to an astonishing height of ten feet and goes around the 280 feet long track twice in 40 seconds, whoop-di-doo. Still Road Runner Railway has been described as a particularly rough ride, especially for adults, which probably has something to do with its limited leg room. Anyways we’ll probably pass up on this ride, but hey, at least that’ll leave more time for other fun stuff! On the other hand, no on-ride video exists on YouTube or Google, so maybe that could be a suitable challenge for us :D?

Six Flags Great Adventure Rollercoaster Introduction: Part 11

The superhero theme continues with Batman: The Ride, an inverted steel rollercoaster opened in 1993 which resembles the Tornado rollercoaster at Särkänniemi, Finland. Besides the size and form the main difference between the two is that where in Tornado each car has two rows of two seats, Batman accommodates four rides in the only row of each car. Batman: The Ride climbs up 23 feet higher than Tornado up to 105 feet and picks up a top speed of 50 miles per hour being only 4.4 mph faster. Tornado is approximately 400 feet shorter and takes 25 seconds less to complete, but both of them have five inversions. In Batman’s case, two loops, two corkscrews and one zero-g roll.

But since everything is bigger in the US – including rollercoaster’s building budgets – Batman: The Ride’s surrounding and queue area are littered with scenery from the world of Batman and the Batman movie. Music from the film can also be heard in the queue are, so even queuing won’t be boring at all. But the queue area might become a bit too familiar, since Batman: The Ride will probably be one of my favorites because of it’s likeness with Tornado. On the other hand may time bigger rides, like Nitro seen in the background of picture above, will probably steal most of the focus since something like them can’t be experienced in Finland.

Six Flags Great Adventure Rollercoaster Introduction: Part 10

Next up is Skull Mountain, the only enclosed rollercoaster in the park at the moment. Because of it’s enclosed status, Skull Mountain very much resembles a rollercoaster called Linnunrata (Finnish for Milky Way), in the Linnanmäki amusement park. Both of them feature sound effects and strobe lights, but due to fear of epileptic seizures, the strobe lights were removed from Skull Mountain some time ago. Therefore the ride takes place in total darkness, so in order to see anything beforehand; I chose a video shot when the (normal) lights were on.

Opened in 1996, with the lights on Skull Mountain is one of the more mellow rollercoasters in Six Flags Great Adventure, but with the lights out the intensity is probably a lot higher, especially for first timers. Since Skull Mountain is enclosed, it is the park’s only rollercoaster which operates even during thunderstorms, when all the other coasters are closed and of course also during rainstorms, when the more than ten times taller Kingda Ka is closed. Skull Mountain rises only 41 feet, but manages to reach a top speed of 33 miles per hour. It has a length of 1337 feet and takes a bit over two minutes to complete.

Six Flags Great Adventure Rollercoaster Introduction: Part 9

Next up is one of the parks many rides that are based on a cartoon or comic character or series. Built in 2003, Superman: Ultimate Flight is painted red-blue-yellow, just the colors that the man of steel likes to dress up in. The riding position is designed to imitate flight, so the train travels beneath the track and guests ride in a lay-down position when the restraints are lifted into their horizontal position.

And so begins a climb up to 115 feet, followed by a plunge of 100 feet achieving a top speed of 51 miles per hour, winding through two inversion and several turns a total of 2759 feet for approximately two minutes. One of the inversions is a pretzel loop, which means beginning from the top and doing a downward loop where top speed is achieved while passengers are laying on their backs. The name of the pretzel loops comes from the fact, that it resembles a pretzel from a certain angle. Now that would be a serious challenge: Eating a pretzel while going through a pretzel loop, especially due to the fact that bringing food onto rides is probably forbidden :D!

Six Flags Great Adventure Rollercoaster Introduction: Part 8

Eigth in line is the park’s slowest rollercoaster Blackbeard’s Lost Treasure Train, which was built in 1999 and has a whopping maximum speed of 22.4 miles per hour. It has a massive height of 26 feet and it’s 1181 feet long ride takes just over a minute to complete. There is a bright side to the ride’s less intense nature, but I have yet to discover what it is :D! Just kidding! The bright side is that it has extremely short queue times and nowadays completes two circuits around the track.

As seen in the picture above, the train has a total of 20 cars making it one of the longest ones on any rollercoaster. Therefore the ride experience varies a lot depending on where you sit. If we have enough time, we should try riding it at least three times: Once in front, once at the back and once in the middle. But if time is of the essence, then at least this bad boy’s gonna head for the bigger ones B)!

Six Flags Great Adventure Rollercoaster Introduction: Part 7

Like I mentioned last week, next up is the wooden rollercoaster called El Toro, which is Spanish for bull. El Toro opened in 2006 being the park’s newest rollercoaster, and it isn’t a traditional wooden rollercoaster at all. Instead of a chain lift, a cable lift is used to pull the train up the first hill allowing it to be pulled much faster and at a steeper angle. The ride doesn’t rattle and shake like traditional wooden rollercoasters, but is modernly smooth like most steel rollercoasters. Despite of its smoothness, El Toro is no dull ride. Instead its one of the world’s fastest, tallest and steepest wooden rollercoasters. It climbs up to 181 feet, plummets down 176 feet in a 76 degree sometimes reaching a max speed of up to 75 miles per hour.

El Toro is also known for extreme air-time, where the rides feel weightless due to negative g-forces, and for its several headchoppers present when it swerves around itself and Rolling Thunder. Due to the extreme air-time, El Toro has a much stricter policy regarding lap restraints and thus the waist size of passengers. Luckily a test seat is located near, where "guests of exceptional size" or nowadays more politically correctly "guests of unique body shapes" (I lost my poker face big time while reading that :D) can test whether they meet the requirements. All things considered I think El Toro is going to be one of my favorites, even though it doesn’t have any inversions. The truth might be just like the guy on the embedded video says: It’s almost even better than… sexual intercourse! (With a one-armed leprechaun :D) I can hardly wait =)!

Six Flags Great Adventure Rollercoaster Introduction: Part 6

In order to introduce all the rollercoasters of Six Flags Great Adventure, from now on every other time I’m going to have to focus on one of the slower less intense rollercoaster. But a bit of variance is always better, and I don’t want to cram them all at the end, because that spot is reserved for a brand new rollercoaster that’s going to open at the end of April. Therefore next on the list is the park’s first ever rollercoaster the Runaway Mine Train (picture below), which opened in 1974 . Kingda Ka, Rolling Thunder (white) and El Toro (under construction), which is up next week, can be seen in the background.

Runaway Mine Train’s height of 60 feet might not scare everyone, and its steepest incline is only 20 degrees, but it still manages to reach a top speed of 38 miles per hour. 2665 feet of steel track goes by in two minutes, including a stretch very close to the surface of a small lake (as seen in the picture). One mustn’t forget that usually the good side of such not-so-popular rides is that you might be able to ride it many times over without even exiting in between =).

Six Flags Great Adventure Rollercoaster Introduction: Part 5

Next up is the Great American Scream Machine (GASM for short), which is a steel corkscrew rollercoaster built in 1989. When it opened it was the world’s tallest rollercoaster for a whole month. GASM rises up to 173 feet and drops down 155 feet reaching a top speed of 68 miles per hour. The ride length is 3800 feet and ride time 2:20 so one could consider it a larger, faster and more complex version of the Korkkiruuvi (Finnish for corkscrew) rollercoaster in Särkänniemi amusement park in Finland. In addition to the two corkscrews found on Korkkiruuvi, GASM has three vertical loops and one batwing a.k.a. boomerang double loop (the opposite of a cobra roll) making the total number of inversion seven, which is the same as with Medusa.

GASM’s track and trains are of course colored to match the American flag, and the trains are named accordingly: Freedom, Liberty and Spirit. Even without such patriotism I’m sure I will be engulfed in a spirit of great Americanism :D, since no rollercoaster in Finland comes even close to what GASM has to offer :(. All the more reason to be exited about our upcoming trip and all the more memorable it’s going be =)! Perhaps even an orGASMic experience, LOL!

Six Flags Great Adventure Rollercoaster Introduction: Part 4

The next rollercoaster’s name is very accurate, at least if you suffer from a heart disease, since after riding it you’ll probably need to take some nitroglycerin pills to stay alive :D! When built in 2001, Nitro was the east coast’s tallest and fastest rollercoaster until Kingda Ka was built four years later. Nitro climbs up to 230 feet and then plummets 215 feet in a 66 degree angle gaining a speed of 80 miles per hour, wow!
And that’s not all. Unlike Kingda Ka, Nitro isn’t a short ride with just a couple of drops, but instead a full blown rollercoaster with a length of almost 5400 feet and ride time of more than two minutes. Because it doesn’t have any inversions, Nitro can use simpler lap restraints to make the ride even more intense when dealing with up to 4 G’s of down force. An on-ride photo is taken at the bottom of the first drop, and on a clear night the skyline of Philadelphia can be seen from a few tall points even though it’s 50 miles away. The stars of the first embedded video must be somehow related to MatoApina, since they make noise just like us on the second one :D!

Six Flags Great Adventure Rollercoaster Introduction: Part 3

Next we have a traditional wooden rollercoaster called Rolling Thunder. It’s sort of a bigger version of this rollercoaster in the Linnanmäki amusement park, since it goes faster, higher and stronger by rising nearly a hundred feet in the air plummeting 85 feet down reaching a top speed of 56 miles per hour.
Besides the shape, one of the biggest differences between the two is that Rolling Thunder doesn’t have an old school braking system, where a park employee known as the “brakeman” rides in the train and uses the train’s own brakes to smoothen the ride. While Rolling Thunder is only 50 feet longer, another significant difference compared to most rollercoasters, is that it has two tracks running alongside each other the whole time, only slightly varying in vertical inclines. If the queuing system allows it, we should definitely try to get on both the dueling trains at the same time, and videotape each other “speeding” by in the other train :D! Conveniently videos from both tracks can be found at YouTube and embedded below.

Six Flags Great Adventure Rollercoaster Introduction: Part 2

This week’s rollercoaster introduction is for the the world’s first floorless rollercoaster, the twisting steel rollercoaster called Medusa, which was built in 1999 an has a total of seven inversions! At least three of them are visible in the picture below. The picture is dominated by a cobra roll, which means two half loops combined by two half corkscrews, thus making the track do a 180 degree turn back to the way it came.

A similar cobra element can be found on the Tornado rollercoaster in Särkänniemi amusement park in Finland, but as the Finnish saying goes: “Everything is bigger in America”, that cobra roll is probably at least half the size of the one on Medusa! The queue line for the Medusa begins under the cobra roll, and the on-ride camera is attached to the Medusa sign, so in order to get a goofy on-ride photo, we have to remember to make funny faces at that spot :D! The Medusa is most definitely going to be an aweosme and wild ride, since it sores to a height of 142 feet and has a top speed of 61 miles per hour. It’s length is close to 4000 feet and the ride time is more than two minutes, which is quite a lot compared to many rollercoasters in Finland, FUCK YEAH =)!

Six Flags Great Adventure Rollercoaster Introduction: Part 1

Me and my MatoApina friends are planning a tourist trip to New York this summer, and my travel fever is getting pretty high although it’s still at least six months away. Therefore I decided to start a series introducing every rollercoaster in Six Flags Great Adventure, where we are planning to spend at least one day of our trip. What better way to spread the fever :D, than to tell some facts of each of the awesome rollercoaster there and embed a point-of-view video from YouTube? I’m going to start from the tallest, fastest and probably most intense one of them all, the world record holding rollercoaster called Kingda Ka (picture below).

It holds the current world record for the world’s fastest and tallest rollercoaster! It accelerates from 0 to 128 miles per hour using hydraulic motors in a mere 3.5 seconds and rises vertically to a whopping 456 feet. In other words: HOLY FUCKING SHIT what a ride it’s gonna be!!! You don’t experience someting like that every day, so I can hardly wait for it =)!