Six Flags Great Adventure is an amusement park located approximately 20 miles southeast of Trenton in Jackson,New Jersey. Owned and operated by Six Flags,the park complex is situated between New York City and Philadelphia and includes a water park named Hurricane Harbor. It first opened to the public as simply Great Adventure in 1974 under the direction of restaurateur Warner LeRoy. Six Flags acquired the park in 1977. The park is located right off of Interstate 195 and is along Monmouth Road.
Six Flags AstroWorld,also known simply as AstroWorld,was a seasonally operated amusement park in Houston,Texas. Owned and operated by Six Flags,the park was situated between Kirby Drive and Fannin Street,directly south of I-610. The park opened on June 1,1968,and was developed originally and constructed as part of the Astrodomain,the brainchild of local philanthropist and former Houston mayor Roy Hofheinz,who intended it to complement the Astrodome. The Hofheinz family sold AstroWorld to Six Flags in 1978.
Six Flags Darien Lake is a 1,200-acre (4.86 km2) amusement park and resort located in Darien,New York,off of Interstate 90 between Buffalo and Rochester. Six Flags Darien Lake features a theme park,water park,campground and lodging. It is owned by EPR Properties and operated by Six Flags.
A stand-up roller coaster is a roller coaster where passengers aboard a train stand throughout the course of the ride. The first manufacturer to employ the format was TOGO,a Japanese company that converted two traditional roller coasters in 1982 to stand-up configurations. Arrow Dynamics followed suit in the United States the following year with their own conversion. The first roller coaster designed from the ground up as a stand-up coaster was King Cobra,built by TOGO,which opened at Kings Island in 1984. Intamin and Bolliger &Mabillard (B&M) have also designed stand-up models beginning in the 1990s,with the latest opening in 2023 as Pipeline:The Surf Coaster in SeaWorld Orlando.
Six Flags Magic Mountain,formerly known and colloquially referred to as simply Magic Mountain,is a 209-acre (85 ha) amusement park located in Valencia,California,35 miles (56 km) northwest of downtown Los Angeles. It opened on May 29,1971,as a development of the Newhall Land and Farming Company and Sea World Inc. In 1979,Six Flags purchased the park and added "Six Flags" to the park's name.
Kingda Ka is a retired hydraulically launched steel roller coaster located at Six Flags Great Adventure in Jackson,New Jersey,United States. Manufactured by Intamin and designed by Werner Stengel,Kingda Ka opened as the tallest and fastest roller coaster in the world on May 21,2005,surpassing Top Thrill Dragster. It was the second strata coaster ever built,exceeding 400 feet (120 m) in height. Both were made with similar designs,although Kingda Ka's layout added an airtime hill on the return portion of the track.
Arrow Dynamics was an American manufacturing and engineering company that specialized in designing and building amusement park rides,especially roller coasters. Based in Clearfield,Utah,the company was the successor to Arrow Development (1946–1981) and Arrow Huss (1981–1986),which were responsible for several influential advancements in the amusement and theme park industries. Among the most significant was tubular steel track,which provided a smoother ride than the railroad style rails commonly used prior to the 1960s on wooden roller coasters. The Matterhorn Bobsleds at Disneyland,built in 1959,was Arrow's first roller coaster project.
A shuttle roller coaster is any roller coaster that ultimately does not make a complete circuit,but rather reverses at some point throughout its course and traverses the same track backwards. These are sometimes referred to as boomerang roller coasters,due to the ubiquity of Vekoma's Boomerang coaster model.
Batman:The Ride is an inverted roller coaster based on the DC Comics character Batman and found at seven Six Flags theme parks in the United States and at least one outside the US. Built by consulting engineers Bolliger &Mabillard,it rises to a height of between 100 and 105 feet and reaches top speeds of 50 mph (80 km/h). The original roller coaster at Six Flags Great America was partially devised by the park's general manager Jim Wintrode. Batman:The Ride was the world's first inverted roller coaster when it opened in 1992,and has since been awarded Coaster Landmark status by the American Coaster Enthusiasts. Clones of the ride exist at amusement parks around the world.
Great American Scream Machine was a steel roller coaster located at Six Flags Great Adventure in Jackson Township,New Jersey. The 173-foot-tall (53 m) ride opened in 1989 as the tallest and fastest looping roller coaster in the world,reaching a maximum speed of 68 mph (109 km/h). It was designed by Ron Toomer and manufactured by Arrow Dynamics,which built two other coasters with similar layouts –Shockwave at Six Flags Great America and Viper at Six Flags Magic Mountain. Great American Scream Machine featured seven inversions including a batwing and double corkscrew. Records set by the ride were succeeded by Viper the following year in 1990. It operated until July 2010 and was replaced by a stand-up roller coaster,Green Lantern,in 2011.
Superman:Escape from Krypton,originally known as Superman:The Escape,is a steel shuttle roller coaster located at Six Flags Magic Mountain in Valencia,California. At the time of its opening in 1997,it was the tallest roller coaster in the world,a title which it lost to Top Thrill Dragster in 2003 and regained in 2024 with the closure of the then-tallest coaster,Kingda Ka. Its maximum speed of 100 mph (160 km/h) was tied for the fastest with Tower of Terror II,a similar roller coaster which opened two months earlier at Dreamworld in Australia. Both were the first to utilize Linear Synchronous Motor (LSM) launch technology to propel vehicles,although the intended opening date in 1996 at Magic Mountain was postponed due to issues with the launch system.
Green Lantern,formerly known as Chang,is a decommissioned stand-up roller coaster located at Six Flags Great Adventure in Jackson Township,New Jersey. Green Lantern stood 155 feet (47 m) tall and featured a top speed of 63 miles per hour (101 km/h). The 4,155-foot-long (1,266 m) ride featured five inversions and had a duration of approximately 21⁄2 minutes. The steel coaster was designed and built by Swiss manufacturer Bolliger &Mabillard.
The Riddler's Revenge is a steel stand-up roller coaster located at Six Flags Magic Mountain. Manufactured by Bolliger &Mabillard,the ride opened as the park's eleventh roller coaster on April 4,1998,setting multiple world records among stand-up coasters. Originally located in the Movie District section of the park,which later became Metropolis in 2017,The Riddler's Revenge was also the park's single biggest investment at a cost of $14 million. It features a height of 156 feet (48 m),a maximum speed of 65 mph (105 km/h),six inversions,and a track length of 4,370 feet (1,330 m).
XLR-8 was a suspended roller coaster located at the defunct Six Flags AstroWorld. Manufactured by Arrow Huss at a cost of $3.2 million,the ride opened to the public in 1984,where it operated until the park's closure in 2005. It was one of Arrow's first attempts at producing a successful suspended coaster following troubles with The Bat at Kings Island,which operated briefly from 1981 to 1983.
La Vibora was a steel bobsled roller coaster at Six Flags Over Texas in Arlington,Texas,United States. The roller coaster had operated at the park from 1986 to 2024.
Shockwave was a roller coaster manufactured by Arrow Dynamics at Six Flags Great America in Gurnee,Illinois. Standing 170 feet (52 m) tall and reaching speeds of 65 miles per hour (105 km/h),it opened in 1988 as the world's tallest and fastest looping roller coaster with a record-breaking seven inversions:three vertical loops,a boomerang,and two regular corkscrews. Shockwave was closed in 2002 and has been dismantled.
Shockwave was a stand-up roller coaster located at Kings Dominion in Doswell,Virginia. Opened in 1986,it was the third stand-up roller coaster installation built and designed by Japanese company TOGO. Following closures of the previous two,it became the oldest of its kind still in operation. After nearly thirty years in operation,Shockwave closed permanently on August 9,2015. It was replaced by Delirium,a Mondial Revolution flat ride,which opened in 2016.
Cobra was a stand-up roller coaster located at La Ronde amusement park in Montreal,Quebec,Canada. Built by Intamin,Cobra opened to the public in 1988 at Skara Sommarland amusement park,where it operated until 1994. It reopened at La Ronde the following season in 1995 and was one of only three stand-up roller coasters manufactured by Intamin. Cobra was removed from the park's website in 2016 and then demolished in 2018.
Amusement rides and stunt shows themed to the Batman franchise its derivative elements are commonly found at Warner Bros. and Six Flags amusement parks across the world.
