What Rides Scares the Crud Out Of You?

[griffonj2022]

^I was just thinking that when I was reading your post. Totally right though, as it is one of my favorite rides that still scares the crap out of me. The scariest part though isn't the launch, it's the top hat. Once it hits the top, it throws you up and out, feeling like you're getting tossed into Comet Hollow across the park!

[89James89]

Huracana Condor. Seriously I hate drop towers but my ex managed to drag me onto it. Never again am I going on a drop tower that high.

 

Didn't help that I had severe sunburn on my shoulders. Nearly collapsed as I got off because of the agony and the woman beside me was worried she'd hit me on the ride or something like that. Still it was pretty fun though.

 

Oh and the Magic Mouse at Brean Leisure park. Thought it was going to derail on every harpin. Went on it three times though just to make sure you don't die.

 

Cheers

 

89James89

[harper83087]

^^&^^^ Surprise laynches are good by me. When I was able to ride Wicked Twister, stupid gut , the ops always had fun. A lot of "Three, tw..*launch*" and once the guy counted to ten before launching us.

[KDcoasterMAN]

El Toro front row scared the shiz out of me!

[NintendoNerd]

At my local theme park the Intiman drop tower FREAKS ME OUT. I have not been on it in years. Im going to try to make myself go on it on my next visit.

I have heard that other drop towers are just slightly slowed down during the drop to make it less intense but that makes it not a true free fall.

The drop tower at my local theme park is really intense because it Is a true un-braked free fall.

The drop tower is called the 'FearFall' Guess what theme park im talking about!

 

Hint: My country is next to Australia...

[PriestofSyrinx]

Intimidator (Carowinds) first hill scared the crap out of me, something I have not felt before.... and it did it everytime I rode the ride

[greatamerica1990sfan]

No ride! I'll go on any even the Xtreme Skyflyer at CGA(if it didn't cost $20!) But I'm just afarid of having a white out on a very fast coaster like if I go on Millenimum Force.

[BBparks57]

I believe it's been posted already, but the SkyCoaster in FunSpot (Old town) is still one of the few rides left that just takes me off my guard completely. I just did it for the first time in a few years tonight and I really thought that I'd be over the anxiety, but going up I was freaking out. Seeing the Disney fireworks from the top was pretty awesome, but the moment right before pulling that cord is still one of the worst for me!

[bigbill245]

I get little concerned when i see a wooden coaster swaying at least a foot when a train rides thru, or when you can feel a wooden coaster train flex while riding. It has been some time when i have had the crud scared outta me.

[reactstudios]

x2 is so scary/epic!

[Schrecken]

When I was 6 years old Space Mountain at WDW scared the daylights out of me; my mom's friend took all of us on it and none of us had any idea there was a coaster in that building, or at least I didn't since I was a child. I don't think my mom did, either, since she was concerned about all the warnings they post about people who shouldn't ride, but didn't put 2 + 2 together and figure it was a coaster.

 

Unfortunately that lead to more than 2 decades of coaster phobia, but in between those years my cousin dared me to go on the Rebel Yell with him at KD when we were 13. That also scared the life out of me as my hands ached when I got off from holding on so tight.

 

Then a family friend dragged me on the Mind Eraser at SFA (back when the park was known as Adventure World) and I thought I was going to die! Any headbanging I might have received was the least of my worries as I was terrified of any ride that went upside down, and terrified of coasters in general.

 

Needless to say, I got over my coaster phobia and rode every coaster I could after that. Years went by, and practically nothing scared me and I found my self becoming a bit jaded.

 

But then I had the opportunity to go to CP for the first time in 04'. And this time, there were two coasters there that made me very nervous - Top Thrill Dragster (even though I had ridden Hypersonic at KD, it was no where near as fast and tall) and Millennium Force. I was there for Coastermania, which meant that I got my chance to face down TTD first thing in the morning, very early in the morning. The lines were fairly short, maybe 20 mins or so, and it didn't take long to get to the boarding area. My fear didn't truly escalate until I was strapped into my seat, and then I must have looked truly petrified because one of the people I was with (who was going to get on the train after us, there were three of us) said something to the effect of "Hey, you'll be OK". No die hard experienced coaster fan ever wants to show fear on a ride, and I was failing badly at trying to mask my angst. When the train pulled up into the launch area, I had one of those experiences where the whole world seems to go silent and time slows way down, and all I could hear was my racing heart beat. I know I sat there in sheer terror for what seemed like forever as the brake fins dropped and the train slid forward in to the launch position. Then I was overcome by the speed and forces of the launch, and was finally able to catch a breath as the train crested the top hat. After the ride was over and I got off, I swear my hands just shook uncontrollably for at least a few minutes. I was totally wired for the rest of the morning, especially after about 3 more rides on TTD. I'm no morning person but I certainly was wide awake then! Other launched coasters have never really scared me that much, as most are magnetically operated and simply don't have the raw power and speed of these huge cable-launched coasters. Hypersonic did when I first rode it, as it did indeed have plenty of power and speed, but it looked like a kiddie ride in the face of TTD.

 

We saved MF for the night ERT, and again, much the same thing happened - this time it was the speed and steepness of the lift hill + at night you really can't see diddly squat over at that end of the park, and the top of the lift hill appears to vanish into the night sky. Again, I got another comment from that same person in our group regarding my terrified expression. The rise to the top of the never-ending hill was really frightful, and I anticipated that super-steep drop with dread. But luckily, as soon as we got over the hill and into the drop, I was having a blast. One thing about MF, you do get a good chance to release all that pre-ride tension over the long course of the coaster.

 

Since then, there have been a few rides (or elements of rides) that have scared me, and some that I just won't ride because they startle me and leave me with a very uncomfortable sensation.

 

I normally like sky lifts but the one at Knoebels really creeped me out, as it was very steep going up the side of that hill + the seats had seemingly minimal restraints and were very open like a park bench. I kept fearing I would fall out or something, and it was worse on the way down.

 

Then there was the sky coaster at SFMM. I found the courage to go on it with a couple of guys I met at an ACE event there, and I was glad that one of them was the cord puller. I also did the one at KI, and this time I was with a guy who was scared to death of it and I was the cord puller there. I also did one of those slingshot rides but I don't recall being that scared, I was only worried that the equipment was safe and in good working condition, not scared of the ride itself.

 

The only other things that creep me out are Vekoma flying coasters. The last time I rode Firehawk at KD and Batwing at SFA I felt very uneasy because the restraints seem so minimal, at least compared to B&M flyers. It's a very good thing on a Vekoma when you don't have a restraint element boxing your head in, but I swear I keep feeling like I'm going to fall out on these rides, especially in the drops where your body presses against the restraints. I actually bowed out of an ERT session on Firehawk a few years ago because with every ride I got more and more creeped out and couldn't deal with it. I told my friends I had a headache so I didn't have to admit I was scared. I will still ride these coasters, but I have a hard time enjoying them if the fear raises its ugly head and I have to keep a death grip on what little there is to hold onto.

 

Drop towers (except for the bounce-type, like Liberty Launch at HW) are also things I won't ride. They don't scare me like some of the rides I have described here, but they do startle the heck out of me and I find that sensation very unpleasant. Sort of like when there's a thunderstorm raging outside, you know it's happening but still, if you get a window-rattling clap of thunder real close by, you still might jump out of your seat. I know and expect the drop on these rides, but still it startles me really badly and it doesn't even have any way to recover from that, like on a coaster where after the drop or launch there are other elements to help dump the adrenaline out of your system. So I generally avoid these rides.

[XYZ]

Orbit @ CGA, I'm never going on that or any Schwarzkopf Enterprises.

 

Sorry about bumping this thread, but I saw this post I did 2 years ago and I think it is hilarious since I went on Orbit, my first Schwarzkopf Enterprise, for the first time today.

 

I will say that slow inverting rides scare the crud out of me, nowadays.

[ragged#1]

Untamed Canobie Lake Park. I went for the ACE coaster con and the drop scared the crap out of me.

[I305]

For me it has to be Intamin free fall towers, or any large drop ride that slowly lifts you to the top.. They are the only ride I e been on that still scares me, but not enough to keep me off of them!

[alwaysairtime14]

Goliath or any inverted boomerang. The vertical ascent is terrifying for me. Legs dangling while looking straight down 180 feet over asphalt is not fun.

All drop towers can be interesting at the top.

Wild mouses used to have me in a white knuckle grip! Seriously!

[I305]

Some more I thought of are chance zippers )when you dive over the top and are pinned against the door, and you can hear the door creak)", as well as the Chance Pharoh's Fury rides when you sit in the back row (the ejector airtime is crazy, and to add to the insanity, the bar is a good few inches off your legs)

 

As for rides that are so scary I will not ride it, is skycoasters... However, I personally dont count them as "rides" so I can p***y out of riding them lol.

 

Another thing I found strange was that any kind of invert used to look really menacing to me when I was very young.. Probably because at local parks the largest most intense ride at the time was inverts (sLC, B&M, whatever it was depending on the park)

[Sjcomora]

I remember when my mom dragged me on SheiKra in '07. I wasn't exactly afraid of the coaster; I was just a little nauseous before we got on, but I finally gave in. I actually felt less nauseous after I got off! Thank god I agreed to get on that thing! We rode twice more after that.

[Subject_12]

I rode a drop ride at my local fair, and I accidentally undid my seat belt at the top.

[Schrecken]

Then there are rides and coasters (perhaps not a distinctive enough category to have its own thread) that cause moderate to serious misgivings and give even the most jaded riders pause. I can't say I've had anything really scare me badly since those coasters I've mentioned in a previous reply, but I have had a couple of rides that I was "concerned" about riding.

 

I've run across two rides in the past year that I got nervous about riding, simply because of their storied reputations. One was the Zipper I ran across at the Maryland state fair last summer. I had heard a lot about this legendary flat ride (and even some grave warnings from my mom, who rode one with a friend as I watched when I was a child, and forbade me to ride it - so for me the Zipper is truly the ride my mother warned me about ) and I waited for quite a while after I got to the fair before I took a ride. And while it didn't scare the daylights out of me, I do think if I had ridden one years ago before I was exposed to some of the rides that I mentioned before, that it would have scared the heck out of me for sure. And yes, the reputation is well-deserved.

 

Then there was my worries about Skyrush during my trip to HP three weeks ago (I also went back there this past Monday). It was that coaster's fearsome reputation that caused me to spend all day avoiding it (part of that was a fear of it giving me a killer back ache + it was a Saturday and I heard the lines were longer in the early part of the day), and when I did finally decide to ride it, I was pretty nervous beforehand. I was really hoping on that short trip up the lift hill that I hadn't made a mistake as far as my back was concerned, where of course there isn't much time to think of anything. Like the Zipper, the ride didn't scare me, but it did take my breath away and blow my mind. Skyrush didn't live up to its reputation of being rough and painful (though the one front wing seat ride I took didn't make my back feel real good; a back wing seat might have had me in pain had I taken that chance) but it did live up to the reports of providing killer airtime.

 

So I've run into a few rides since then that didn't really scare me, but, because of their reputation, had me rather nervous about taking my first ride.

[TheAmazingCP]

After today, I have to say StratosFear at Knoebel's. I've never been on an ARM drop tower before, but I'd read about them on here. I wasn't prepared for the freefall though. There's a slight slow at the top before you just drop. I've been on several S&S towers and this was far more intense. It really was just a dead weight drop. The brakes catch so late that you think you'll hit the ground, too.

[Angry_Gumball]

Who woulda thought a 70-foot drop tower would freak me out over the world's tallest drop tower? Yup, this is true! I rode a Larson/ARM drop tower at the beginning of the month and found it to be quite crazy actually. Other than looking at the shadow, you can not tell when you're at the top of the tower as the cabin has an overhang obstructing your view. As soon as the cabin gets to the top it immediately drops! Well, it more or less actually feels like it shoots you down as I had more ejector airtime on this while I just had that tingly floaty airtime on the Intamin-based towers.

 

And capsule-based water slides, where you climb into the coffin-like box, lean against the wall and wait to be dropped nearly straight down. It happens so quick you honestly don't have time to react or realize what just happened

[alwaysairtime14]

Chance Pharoh's Fury rides when you sit in the back row (the ejector airtime is crazy, and to add to the insanity, the bar is a good few inches off your legs)

 

OMG yes! I've never been so scared on a pirate ship in my life! I was gripping onto the bar so much it hurt! I don't even sit in the back of Pharoh's Fury anymore, the second to last row is enough thrill for me!

[JonnyRCT3]

Any chairlift / sky bucket ride scares me. I'd rather walk.

[Blazen_AZN]

^ Yes! I went on the chairlift-style ride at Sea World San Diego the other day and just about lost my mind! I never realized how terrifying those things are. They just seem so unstable!

 

Mickey's Fun Wheel at DCA is an honorable mention from my childhood. Anything at SFMM was fine. That ride, though, traumatized me.

[Koasterking48]

Wile Firehawk/X-Flight itself doesn't scare me, those vests sure make me put faith in those Dutch engineers...