It’s always an exciting time when Six Flags gets a new coaster, especially for roller coaster extremists like myself. When the Goliath premiered in 2006, I just had to ride it! Now, I wasn’t among the first because I wanted to wait  until any kinks that were going to arise were knocked out before I got there, but when I did get to ride the coaster, it was amazing. Hopefully the new ride premiering next year, the Dare Devil Dive, will be just as amazing.

The Dare Devil Dive; just the name sounds exciting! Dare Devil Dive will feature a 10-story vertical lift and a first drop that dives beyond vertical as it plunges. It will be located in the USA section, and no other rides will be eliminated. Now, this is what perplexes me. For those of you who are familiar with Six Flags Over Georgia, you know that the Goliath has overtaken much of the USA section; I honestly don’t know where this new coaster will go unless they take out the game section and some of the restaurants. It’ll be interesting to see what they come up with.

Dare Devil Dive, was custom-designed and engineered by Germany-based Gerstlauer Rides. It is scheduled to open Memorial Day weekend in 2011. Here’s a description of the coaster made by the company in a press release:

“It begins with guests being pulled straight up to the sky on a special vertical chain lift, then slowly rolling to the top of the tower nearly 100 feet in the air. After an agonizing pause at the crest of the summit, the coaster car plummets downward at an angle that is beyond straight down — it actually angles inward at a blistering 52 miles per hour.

“The ride then careens through a thrilling combination of diving loops while executing three inversions before riders catch air on a zero gravity hill and swoop across the dreaded Immelmann vertical U turn stretched high above the ground. the crescendo builds as the car drives toward the ground and up in to a Heartline roll before being slowed by the magnetic brakes.”

At launch, the ride sounds similar to the Free Fall ride that the park had years ago, and it also sounds similar to the Acrophobia. I guess we’ll have to see next summer.

photo credit: Wikipedia