in association with
Park Hoppin’
Taking the plunge I
f visiting Coney Island's Luna Park is like stepping into a Zamperla sales office, then walking into Cedar Point is what it must feel like if Bolliger & Mabillard (B&M) had a showroom. You enter the
park beneath Gate Keeper, the Ohio park's B&M Wing Coaster. Just down the midway you walk past Raptor, a B&M Inverted Coaster. Next to that is Valravn, Cedar Point's new B&M Dive Coaster. Just beyond that is Rougerou, the B&M Floorless Coaster that used to be the B&M Stand-Up Coaster, Mantis. It felt like I was in B&M Land. On this day I was to
experience Valravn. I love dive coasters, having now ridden four of the 10 B&M rides currently operating. An 11th is scheduled to open in 2017 at Happy Valley Chengdu in China and then a 12th in 2018 at Liseberg, Gothenburg, Sweden. Dive coasters begin with at least one 90° drop.
Unlike other rollercoasters where the lift hill is immediately followed by the first drop, a B&M Dive Coaster lift hill leads to a flat section of track followed by a holding brake which stops the train just as it enters the vertical drop, leaving it hanging precipitously as the screaming begins. After a few seconds, the train is released and the screaming intensifies. Oblivion at Alton Towers, the world's first B&M Dive Coaster, is one of my
favourites because it drops riders into a black hole (a trick repeated on the longer ride of the same name at sister park Gardland). SheiKra at Busch Gardens Tampa holds a place in my heart because of the 10-wide seating, also found on various rides in China. If you're lucky enough to get a corner seat there is nothing below you, just air. I also enjoy the rooster-tail water brake found on Sheikra and other various other Dive Coasters including Griffon at Busch Gardens Williamsburg Valravn is special, too, because it is the tallest Dive Coaster built to date. I'm
pictured here restrained and ready for my journey. Upon opening, Valravn set 10 world records. Bragging rights and rollercoasters go together like, well, fish and chips. Valravn's records include being the world's tallest dive coaster, fastest dive coaster, longest dive coaster, having the most inversions on a dive coaster, the longest drop on a dive coaster, and the highest inversion on a dive coaster. It also comprises one of the most coasters taller than 200 feet in a single park, one of the most rides in a single park, part of the most steel coaster track at a single park, and the most coaster track at one park. Some of these records may be more significant than others, but the absolute best bragging right is simply that it set 10 world records. For my all-time favourite dive coaster, however, we have to go to a time
before liability insurance. In 1917 John Burke was issued US Patent 1,230,559 for "coaster diving apparatus.” Here's the patent drawing (below). It looked like a typical wooden coaster of the era, but before returning to the loading platform the track passed over a body of water. As passengers neared the end of the ride the coaster car would abruptly stop and tip, spilling riders into the lake. A net below thoughtfully saves them from drowning. There is no record it was ever built, but as I climbed aboard Valvarn with Lake Erie nearby I could only fantasise. Burke's coaster would have set the record for the world's most soggy riders.
NOVEMBER 2016
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