At the end of May our organization collaborated with the Theme Park Engineering Group from The Ohio State University & the University of Cincinnati Coaster Cats on a trip to a quintessential American amusement park:
Holiday World in Santa Claus, Ind!
It is our mission to learn about the engineering and design that has gone into their amazing rides and attractions and Holiday World has an amazing collection of theme park engineering masterpieces to learn from.
While many of our students had never heard of Holiday World until this trip, the park has a very prestigious (and certainly well-deserved) notoriety in the theme park industry.
Holiday World has been consistently recognized by the amusement industry magazine publication
Amusement Today with their coveted "Golden Ticket Awards" in numerous categories.
Most notably Holiday World has rightfully earned the award for
Friendliest Park Staff consecutively for the past eleven years since the creation of the award!
Also they have earned recognition with the award for
Cleanest Park for 9 consecutive years!
Holiday World's waterpark: "Splashin Safari" has also been garnished with the honor of being the #2 waterpark in the ENTIRE world! Spalshin Safari also boasts three water park attractions that have won the "Golden Ticket Award" for
Best New Waterpark Ride in 2003,2006 and 2007.
Now, in terms of roller coasters....
Holiday World has undoubtedly the greatest collection of wooden roller coasters in the entire world!
Raven-
Rated Best Wooden Coaster in the World in 2000 through 2003
Legend-
Rated in the Top 15 Wooden Roller Coaster in the World since it debuted in 2000.
Voyage-
Built in 2006 and Rated Best Wooden Coaster in the World in 2007 & 2008!
NEW THIS YEAR AT HOLIDAY WORLD IS PILGRIM'S PLUNGE!
Touted as the TALLEST & FASTEST water ride in all of terra firma.
Working with wonderful leaders at Holiday World & Splashin Safari we were provided the amazing chance for a behind-the-scenes tour of their new engineering masterpiece.
Special thanks to General Manger Mike and (of course) Paula for answering all of our questions and explaining the entire process from concept development to opening day.
Touring the station, Mike explained how to get the best efficiency out of the ride the load and unload cycle is combined on a continuously moving conveyor- THE BOATS DON'T STOP.
Also, Mike took us above the station and into the Ride-Control Deck and explained the specific functions of the monitoring and safety systems.
Heading outside-one of the Pilgrim's Plunge 10 passenger boats lifted out of the water shows HOW MASSIVE THEY ARE!
Underneath the trains- On the left side you'll notice the wheels that will keep the boats on the rails of the elevator platform and to stay on the rails of the drop.
The parallel steel plates on the right side of the picture will lock in with the platform to keep it in place as the boat rises into the air.
Wait a minute.....
An elevator?
....on a water ride?!
You heard right!
After leaving the station the boats drift along a path of water and up to this conveyor system behind the tower.
The conveyor pulls the boats out of the pool of water and up to an elevator platofrm.
Then once the boat is locked into place the boat will rise straight up-VERY FAST TOO!
In just a matter of seconds the boat and its passengers are 131 feet in the air with little to nothing around you!
Once elevator platform is locked in at the top the boat will release and descends down the 45 degree drop reaches speeds of 50mph when it makes its splashdown-absolutely soaking its passengers!
However as we stood there by Pilgrim's Plunge many students were in awe as were we in the shadow of the monstrous Voyage wooden roller coaster right next door.
Holiday World PR Director Paula even noted this on the Holiday World Twitter:
"GM Mike's talking to 20 engineers-to-be about ride design/capacity. We have to keep stopping when Voyage flies by, distracting us. #hw #fb"
http://twitter.com/HolidayWorld
Having trekked from Ohio most of our student members were looking foward to experiencing the #1 wooden roller coaster in the entire world:
The Voyage!
All three of Holiday World's world class wooden roller coasters have a distinct feel in their design to terrorize and surprise riders in thousands of feet of pure lumber mayhem.
A member of the group stated "they're each like a caged animal let loose!"
Raven, Legend and Voyage were built in the wooded hilly portions of the park tocapitalize on the natural terrain to produce tremednous speeds and height without having to build wood structure high into the air.
Holiday World, Custom Coasters (a former roller coaster design firm-now defunct- designed Raven & Legend), and The Gravity Group (Voyage)made sure to keep as many trees as possible to add to the thrill of these already intense thrill machines.
You'll see the glimpse of a roller coaster train darted through the woods like a predator and masking it's path as you ride so that every bend in turn comes as a surprise.
Venturing deep into the depths of forest where Voyage breaks all previous conceptions of how wooden roller coasters should be designed.
Touring underneath the superstructure of Legend!
We marveled at how close we could get to these mammoth beasts of pure adrenaline thrill and extreme engineering.
This is of course a brief account of the truly amazing weekend we had at Holiday World's Holiwood Night's event and the insightful behind-the-scenes look they provided us.
But most of all I can say that it was also a great chance for all three student organizations to come together,learn about engineering in the theme park industry, meet one another, and have a fun time.
Look forward to a post with more about VOYAGE and our question and answer session with the masterminds that designed it:
The Gravity Group!
Special thanks for the event go to: Will Koch, Pat Koch, Mike Kamp, Paula Warne,Tyler Campbell, Dan Linden and Brad Okeson.
Special thanks for photos go to: Heather Silverman, Jason Cartell, Bryan Thompson and Megan Hathaway!
All Holiday World ride and attraction logos are copyright and property Holiday World & Splashin' Safari, Santa Claus, Ind. ©2009
The Gravity Group Logo is copyright and property The Gravity Group, LLC. ©2009
