Orlando, Florida - Orlando is renowned for the high-wire thrills and spills that have made it a much-loved destination for families and fans of noisy theme parks.
The latest addition to the holiday-friendly Florida city is sure to enhance its reputation.
Water park Aquatica has launched Ihu’s Breakaway Falls – a wild curl of plastic tubing and looping drops that constitutes the tallest and steepest water slide in the city.
The ride comprises four entwined slides, each offering a different experience.
Brave souls prepared to take on the challenge have to climb 126 steps to reach the top of an eight-storey, 24m-high tower.
That means you have to walk up 504 if you want to try each one.
Then they face a decision – to control their descent or leave the moment they take the plunge in the hands of somebody else.
Three of the slides – orange, green and blue – have trapdoor-style floors.
The most fear-inducing aspect of the ride is that thrill-seekers never know when the floor will give way beneath them.
Guests stand on these retractable supports and wait for the ride attendants to press the release button – not quite knowing when their plummet will start.
Those who can’t face the tension can opt for the purple slide – which has a standard entrance where riders simply push themselves off down the tube.
However, the trade-off is that the purple slide is the steepest of the four.
The orange slide is the longest, a spiralling 126m.
Those who are unsure how brave they are feeling should try the green slide, which has the shortest drop of the four – although the descent is 8.5m.
Riders descend at speeds of up to 7m a second when the “trapdoor” opens.
Although a rider’s nerves might bear the brunt of the workout on the way down, they have to put a bit of energy into the experience when they start out.
The Aquatica water park is part of Orlando’s famous SeaWorld attraction and this new ride is the latest of 42 slides featured at the complex. – Daily Mail