Cedar Point Unleashes Valravn
Cedar Point will change the Lake Erie skyline with more than 3,400 feet of thrill ride innovation when it introduces Valravn (val-rey-vuhn), the world's tallest, fastest, and longest dive coaster, in 2016.
Riders on Valravn are carried more than 20 stories up to the top of the coaster's 223-foot-tall first hill. Once there, the train is held perilously over the edge of the first drop for approximately four seconds, giving anxious guests unparalleled views of the park before free-falling a record 214 feet at a completely vertical, 90-degree angle, reaching a top speed of 75 mph!
Valravn then flips passengers upside-down through a 165-foot-tall Immelmann, a fighter jet-like maneuver that takes the train into a half loop, then a half roll before traveling in the opposite direction. The train then approaches another drop zone—but there's no stopping this time, as riders plunge 125 feet down at a near 90-degree angle once again, twisting and turning upside-down two more times, once through a dive loop and then through a 270-degree roll before completing its epic journey over 3,415 feet of tarnished copper and silver steel track.
Valravn is also the signature 100th roller coaster designed by the imaginative coaster minds at Bolliger & Mabillard in Monthey, Switzerland, and will feature ride vehicles never before seen on a dive coaster. Riders will sit eight-across on one of three, 24-passenger floorless trains, featuring tiered seating as well as comfortable over-the-shoulder restraints with interlocking seatbelts, much like those on the park's GateKeeper wing coaster. Valravn can accommodate approximately 1,200 riders per hour and guests must be 54 inches or taller to ride.
Valravn will shatter 10 world records when it debuts next summer, including:
- Tallest dive coaster (223 feet)
- Fastest dive coaster (75 mph)
- Longest dive coaster (3,415 feet)
- Most inversions on a dive coaster (three)
- Longest drop on a dive coaster (214 feet)
- Highest inversion on a dive coaster (165 feet)
- Most roller coasters taller than 200 feet at one amusement park (5)
- Most rides at one amusement park (72)
- Most steel roller coaster track at one amusement park (52,125 feet/9.9 miles)
- Most roller coaster track at one amusement park (60,110 feet/11.4 miles)
Click here for more information about Cedar Point's newest attraction.
Photo courtesy of Cedar Point.