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Manta ride set for splashy debut

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: May 5, 2009

Roller coaster lovers, get ready. You can get a sneak peek at SeaWorld Orlando's new flying roller coaster today.

The theme park will launch Manta at noon and take guests on a ride designed to imitate the underwater experience of a manta ray.

Guests ride facedown in a horizontal position under the belly of a coaster train shaped like a giant manta ray with a 12-foot wingspan.

Riders will swoop and dive at speeds of nearly 60 mph through four inversions on 3,359 feet of track.

"This ride is uniquely SeaWorld," Dan Brown, vice president and general manager of SeaWorld Orlando, said when the plan for the ride was announced in 2008.

The 7-acre, 140-foot-tall attraction will tower over SeaWorld's 200-acres, just inside the entrance, officials said.

The Manta journey will begin as guests enter a mythical village with artisan-created engravings that celebrate manta ray legend and lore.

In addition to the ride, guests can experience "face-to-fin" encounters with 300 rays and thousands of fish. Those include shark rays, spotted eagles rays, leopard rays, cownose rays and oscillate river rays.

The Swiss coaster-engineering company Bolliger & Mabillard designed the ride.

Ted Jackovics

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