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Special Features: Kingda Ka invades SFGAdv's new jungle

Posted at 12:25 PM EDT (1625 GMT)

Sep. 29th, 2004 -- Six Flags Great Adventure announced they are building the tallest, fastest roller coaster in the world on Wednesday.

Kingda Ka will be 456 feet tall and launch from 0 to 128 mph in 3.5 seconds. Kingda Ka will also feature the world’s longest drop at 418 feet.

The ride, manufactured by Intamin AG of Switzerland, is similar to what will be the previous tallest, fastest coaster, Top Thrill Dragster of Cedar Point in Ohio. It uses the same hydraulic launch mechanism, twists up a 90-degree hill only to return down a 270-degree spiral at a 90-degree drop. Kingda Ka will have a 129-foot-tall camelback directly after the drop that is sure to provide plenty of airtime for its 18 passengers.

Kingda Ka is part of the “largest expansion in the 30-year history of Six Flags Great Adventure,” CEO of Six Flags Inc., Kieran Burke said.

Along with this massive roller coaster, the park will be adding a jungle-themed area called The Golden Kingdom. This 11-acre land will also include children’s area Balin’s Jungle Land; Temple of the Tiger, an educational tiger exhibit; three shops and four eateries.

The nearly three story Balin’s Jungle Land will have five interactive play areas: three wet and two dry, including spray guns, tipping buckets and a “jumping” fountain.

Temple of the Tiger will cover 33,000 square feet, and trainers will interact with the audience and tigers, teaching guests facts about tigers.

The Golden Kingdom will also be home to exotic animals such as cockatoos, a python and monkeys.

The Golden Kingdom and Kingda Ka are scheduled to open in spring 2005.

ThrillNetwork’s Jerry Huster is covering the announcement and giving ThrillNetwork up-to-the-minute information on Kingda Ka and The Golden Kingdom.

To view pictures of this ride, please see our database gallery on Kingda Ka. For video (either to stream or download), please see this page to view it.

Note: We have added additional construction photos from Kingda Ka. You may view them in the database gallery above.

Chip contributed to this report.

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Comments
midgetdogg02 Joined: Jul 2003 Posts: 114 View Park/Ride Count	Can you say AIRTIME!?!?!!!
9/29/2004 12:29 PM
MaGnUmKeLly Joined: Oct 2003 Posts: 2559 View Park/Ride Count	Road Trip....wow that looks sweet.
9/29/2004 12:35 PM
CHILLERLC1 Joined: May 2001 Posts: 8339 View Park/Ride Count	I am glad to welcome the record back to New Jersey! Today at school I wore my old school 30th anniversary shirt. It has the old rainbow logo. I'm a little paranoid about it; I'm not gay. hehe. The word has apparently got out on the college campus here in Jersey. I hear a guy on the way to class tell two girls: "130 in 3 seconds." The truth is out there.
9/29/2004 1:40 PM
DEJA-VU RULES Joined: Sep 2001 Posts: 1989 View Park/Ride Count	I can't wait to ride it next summer the air time is going to be a lot of fun!
9/29/2004 2:12 PM
pyro Joined: Jun 2001 Posts: 431 View Park/Ride Count	Wow that camelback is gonna have massive airtime. Excellent addition to this kind of ride.
9/29/2004 2:13 PM
BryanWood Joined: May 2001 Posts: 4008 View Park/Ride Count	I'm so happy that Cedar Point lost their record. Not only that, GAdv made it taller and showed you can break a record and not make it a one-trick pony! Congrats to Gadv for stealing Cedar Point's thunder. All my Ohio friends will be happy to no longer have to deal with the "world's tallest and fastest" commercials. ;)
9/29/2004 3:12 PM
medieval Joined: Aug 2004 Posts: 2019 View Park/Ride Count	I'm so going on it next year. Possibly after work. Their isn't usually a lot of people on the 1st day...But it all might change this year.
9/29/2004 3:14 PM
Rustbelt Joined: Aug 2003 Posts: 308 View Park/Ride Count	Hmmm.... SFGAd, Dorney and Hershey trek is in order for next year.
9/29/2004 3:33 PM
HPStormRunner22 Joined: Jun 2004 Posts: 1374 View Park/Ride Count	I am so galad this has something more than just a Top Hat. Well done SFGADV for actually building it over 425ft.
9/29/2004 4:16 PM
Distriv Joined: Apr 2004 Posts: 2 View Park/Ride Count	Finally, a sweet new coaster less then an hour from home!
9/29/2004 4:24 PM
Graham Joined: Nov 2001 Posts: 3357 View Park/Ride Count	This looks like it will be a great coaster. Its nice to see that its more than just a top hat.
9/29/2004 5:14 PM
Kraken Joined: May 2001 Posts: 5207 View Park/Ride Count	All "fanboyism" or whatever you want to call it aside... Six Flags as a corporate entity is just plain stupid.
9/29/2004 5:44 PM
Marc Joined: Jul 2001 Posts: 2709 View Park/Ride Count	I'm pretty sure this ride will run better than Top Thrill Dragster did also. I'm glad to see they used the parallel station approch instead of "advanced rolling block" series stations that TTD has that never worked properly. I though it would be neat to see trains run rediculously close to each other, but it turns out they needed them to run too close to make it work. I hope Intamin has figured out the contamination control and catch car problems that plauge TTD. Even with the hill, I don't think it will make the ride much better than TTD. It does give another whole base of people get a chance at riding the worlds tallest coaster. Six Flags is putting good money into this whole project and I hope they do well with it.
9/29/2004 5:49 PM
bk2004 Joined: Oct 2003 Posts: 7743 View Park/Ride Count	Sounds awesome. That airtime hill is going to be sweet. I will definatly have to get up to SFGadv to ride this thing! I hope that the theming is as cool as the pictures are.
9/29/2004 7:09 PM
niomosy Joined: Feb 2004 Posts: 83 View Park/Ride Count	Sounds a bit better than TTD. It's a shame they aren't doing more with the height and speed on that coaster. I'd like to see a park take one of those to its full potential. Still, seems like it should be a fun ride.
9/29/2004 7:49 PM
Kyle L Joined: Jun 2001 Posts: 7109 View Park/Ride Count	This coaster earns the award for lamest innovation ever.
9/29/2004 8:45 PM
Raptor Joined: Jun 2001 Posts: 5130 View Park/Ride Count	Can you say DOWNTIME??!?!!!! I'm going to laugh when this thing is never open and Six Flags spent all that money just so they can say "HAHA Cedar Point, who's the man now??"
9/29/2004 10:27 PM
Aaron Joined: Jun 2001 Posts: 4401 View Park/Ride Count	How is it lame, Kyle, just because it's taller then TTD? Was SD2K considered lame when it beat Millennium Force by eight feet? I love how SF decided to have a whole themed area around this. And then, there's the coaster itself. That airtime hill sounds amazing, not to mention the height, speed, and drop of the whole contraption.
9/29/2004 11:37 PM
coasterlove Joined: May 2001 Posts: 6476 View Park/Ride Count	This thing looks really impressive. Looks to have very nice theming and I like the whole new area. Very nice overall. Stuff like this could be a turnaround for Six Flags.
9/30/2004 1:12 AM
Hurricane Joined: May 2001 Posts: 2228 View Park/Ride Count	This is the first new record breaker with an uncertain future, in that its announcement stirs up a mix of excitement, uncertainty, controversy, and confusion. One thing is certain, Six Flags is taking a gamble for the ages and its future could very well be riding on it!
9/30/2004 12:28 PM

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