Sky Rocket (Kennywood)
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Sky Rocket is a
steel roller coaster A steel roller coaster is a roller coaster that is defined by having a track made of steel. Steel coasters have earned immense popularity in the past 50 years throughout the world. Incorporating tubular steel track and polyurethane-coated whee ...
located at
Kennywood Kennywood is an amusement park located in West Mifflin, Pennsylvania, just southeast of Pittsburgh. The park opened on May 30, 1899, as a trolley park attraction at the end of the Mellon family's Monongahela Street Railway. It was purchased in 1 ...
amusement park near
Pittsburgh Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Wester ...
in
West Mifflin, Pennsylvania West Mifflin is a borough in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, United States, located southeast of downtown Pittsburgh. The population was 20,313 at the 2010 census. It is named after Thomas Mifflin, 1st Governor of Pennsylvania, signer of the Un ...
. Manufactured by
Premier Rides Premier Rides is an amusement ride manufacturer based in the United States. The company was the first to use Linear Induction Motors (LIMs) on their roller coasters. Jim Seay has been the sole owner and company president since 1996. The first r ...
, Sky Rocket opened to the public on June 29, 2010. It was the first major coaster addition at the park in almost a decade following the renovation of
Phantom's Revenge Phantom's Revenge is a steel hypercoaster located at Kennywood amusement park in West Mifflin, Pennsylvania, United States. It originally opened as Steel Phantom in 1991, featuring the fastest speed and longest drop of any roller coaster in the ...
in 2001. It was also the first coaster in the park to feature inversions since the Steel Phantom as well as the first to have a launch since the
Laser Loop Shuttle Loop is a type of steel launched shuttle roller coaster designed by Reinhold Spieldiener of Intamin and manufactured by Anton Schwarzkopf. A total of 12 installations were produced between 1977 and 1982. These 12 installations have be ...
. Sky Rocket is an
electromagnetic In physics, electromagnetism is an interaction that occurs between particles with electric charge. It is the second-strongest of the four fundamental interactions, after the strong force, and it is the dominant force in the interactions of a ...
launch coaster using
linear synchronous motor A linear motor is an electric motor that has had its stator and rotor "unrolled", thus, instead of producing a torque (rotation), it produces a linear force along its length. However, linear motors are not necessarily straight. Characteristicall ...
s (LSM), a first for Premier Rides' designs. Premier had previously only used Linear Induction Motors (LIM) launches on their coasters such as
Flight of Fear Flight of Fear is the name of two identical enclosed roller coasters located at Kings Island and Kings Dominion amusement parks. Built and designed by Premier Rides, they were the world's first launched roller coasters to feature linear inducti ...
at
Kings Island Kings Island is a amusement park located northeast of Cincinnati in Mason, Ohio, United States. Owned and operated by Cedar Fair, the park first opened in 1972 by the Taft Broadcasting Company. It was part of a larger effort to move and expan ...
and
Kings Dominion Kings Dominion is an amusement park located in Doswell, Virginia, north of Richmond, Virginia, Richmond and south of Washington, D.C. Owned and operated by Cedar Fair, the park opened to the public on May 3, 1975, and features more than 60 ri ...
, and
Mr. Freeze Mr. Freeze is a supervillain appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. The character was created by Dave Wood, Sheldon Moldoff and Bob Kane, and first appeared in ''Batman'' #121 in February 1959 as the ice-based criminal Mr. Ze ...
at
Six Flags Over Texas Six Flags Over Texas is a 212-acre (86 ha) amusement park, in Arlington, Texas, east of Fort Worth, Texas, Fort Worth and west of Dallas, Texas, Dallas. It is the first amusement park in the Six Flags chain, and features themed areas and attracti ...
and
Six Flags St. Louis Six Flags St. Louis, originally known as Six Flags Over Mid-America, is an amusement park featuring characters and rides from many Warner Bros. films and tv shows such as, Looney Tunes, DC Comics, and formerly Scooby-Doo. It is located in Eureka ...
. LIMs require more electricity and are costly to maintain while LSMs are much more practical. It was also one of the first roller coasters in the world to feature a cutback inversion, a rather common element seen on more recent coasters. The Sky Rocket occupies the ground near the entrance formerly occupied by Turnpike, an attraction that is expected to return to the park sometime in the future.


History

On August 12, 2009, Kennywood announced the park would build a
prototype A prototype is an early sample, model, or release of a product built to test a concept or process. It is a term used in a variety of contexts, including semantics, design, electronics, and Software prototyping, software programming. A prototyp ...
linear synchronous motor (LSM) launched roller coaster built by Premier Rides for the 2010 season. The coaster did not have a name at the time of its announcement, but the park eventually decided on the name "Sky Rocket", after its ride model. To make space for Sky Rocket, Kennywood retired the Turnpike, an electric antique car ride that had operated at the park since 1966. The Turnpike closed on August 16, 2009 and its cars were placed in storage with the intent that the ride be re-installed in the future, but as of 2023, this has yet to happen. The coaster's track arrived at the park in January 2010. Construction of Sky Rocket was completed in the spring of 2010. The ride opened exclusively to media personnel on June 28, 2010 before officially opening to the public the following day. For the 2017 season, riders were given the option of using a
virtual reality Virtual reality (VR) is a simulated experience that employs pose tracking and 3D near-eye displays to give the user an immersive feel of a virtual world. Applications of virtual reality include entertainment (particularly video games), educ ...
headset when riding for a nominal fee of $5. Due to damages caused by an electrical fire in the ride's engine room in May 2018, the ride was not open for the majority of the 2018 season. Park maintenance confirmed that the generator had been damaged beyond repair and were waiting on a new one being manufactured overseas. They also said they did not have an estimated date for reopening the ride at the time. The ride re-opened on July 14, 2019, after Kennywood announced via a
Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...
video that the Sky Rocket would once again be open to riders.


Ride experience

After exiting the station, the train turns 180 degrees. It then lines up with the launch motors and is accelerated from 0- in 3 seconds. It goes up the
top hat A top hat (also called a high hat, a cylinder hat, or, informally, a topper) is a tall, flat-crowned hat for men traditionally associated with formal wear in Western dress codes, meaning white tie, morning dress, or frock coat. Traditionally m ...
element. As it goes over the edge of the hill, the train is slowed by a holding brake before it plunges down the 90 degree drop and enters a
cutback Cutback or Cutbacks may refer to: * Cutback technique, a destructive technique for determining certain optical fiber transmission characteristics * Cutback (surfing move) * Cutback (roller coaster), a roller coaster inversion similar to a corkscr ...
inversion: two half- corkscrews joined together in opposite directions so that the train exits moving 180 degrees from the direction it entered. It goes straight into a
Zero-G Roll Roller coaster elements are the individual parts of roller coaster design and operation, such as a track, hill, loop, or turn. Variations in normal track movement that add thrill or excitement to the ride are often called "thrill elements". Comm ...
followed by a 180 degree upwards curve into the mid-course
brake run A brake run on a roller coaster is any section of track meant to slow or stop a roller coaster train. Brake runs may be located anywhere along the circuit of a coaster and may be designed to bring the train to a complete halt or to simply adjust ...
. It comes almost to a complete stop only to plummet to the ground with a near-vertical drop. It goes into a low over-banked turn under the cutback, followed by a corkscrew over another piece of track, creating a head-chopper effect. It goes into another over-banked turn, followed by a series of S-curves to add to the excitement. It does one more 180 degree turn into a series of bunny hops going under the corkscrew. It does one final twist straight into the final
brake run A brake run on a roller coaster is any section of track meant to slow or stop a roller coaster train. Brake runs may be located anywhere along the circuit of a coaster and may be designed to bring the train to a complete halt or to simply adjust ...
.


Trains

The two trains are painted red and black with the "Sky Rocket" logo on the front with flame decals. Both trains have two cars which carry six riders each. The ride also features a
lap bar A roller coaster train is a vehicle made up of two or more cars connected by specialized joints which transports passengers around a roller coaster's circuit. It is called a train because the cars follow one another around the track, the same r ...
restraint system, which locks riders in at the waist and calves rather than the shoulders. This gives riders a sense of mobility not usually felt in coasters featuring inversions.


Awards


See also

* Superman: Ultimate Flight (Six Flags Discovery Kingdom), another Premier Rides roller coaster which is considered, by the manufacturer, as Sky Rocket's successor


References

{{Pittsburgh Metro Area Kennywood Roller coasters in Pennsylvania Steel roller coasters Roller coasters introduced in 2010 Launched roller coasters Roller coasters manufactured by Premier Rides