Interactive ride confirmed for 2009
Danish amusement institution Tivoli is to install a Flying Fury interactive plane ride from the Italian manufacturer Technical Park for the 2009 season.
The prototype (pictured above) debuted in summer 2007 at Europark near Linate Airport in Milan and features a pair of two-seater planes mounted to the end of two rotating arms. Passengers control the roll, yaw and speed of the planes using a plasma touch screen, or sit back and enjoy the experience on “auto pilot.”
Billed as “the wildest and fastest interactive ride in Northern Europe,” Tivoli’s version of the ride will stand 30-metres tall when static, with the planes lifting up to 40-metres in height. The main arms will rotate at up to 15rpm – or 100km/h on auto pilot – while each plane can turn at up to 17rpm on the interactive setting.
A competition will be held to find a name for the ride, which will be themed as below to fit in with its surroundings in the Orient section of the park. The planes will be mounted on large wings decorated with gold leaf and onion-shaped domes covered in lights. The design of the planes calls to mind early aviation history.
”Tivoli will never be completed, said Georg Carstensen, the founder of Tivoli, and this is still our belief today,” declares Tivoli managing director Lars Liebst. “Our new ride that will be a truly unique experience – and so wild that it is only for the most courageous of visitors.”
That latter statement is probably just as well as the new attraction will have an hourly capacity of just 125. Replacing the Blue Sapphire children’s Ferris Wheel, it is expected to be ready for take-off on May 1.
The announcement of the daredevil new ride comes just weeks after Tivoli finished its latest winter season, where it debuted a family coaster from Technical Park as part of its Christmas celebrations. With capacity for up to 500 passengers an hour, the reindeer ride features a 71.5-metre L-shaped track and two small hills. As part of the Christmas event, riders were despatched in themed four-seater reindeer cars over a snowy landscape where they could witness pixies and elves.
It has not yet been decided what Tivoli will do with the attraction now that the winter celebrations are over, but Technical Park promises that the cars can easily be switched for a different theme and, as the ride system is trailer mounted, it can be moved to another area of the park with minimum disruption.
