The History of Oblivion - Secret Weapon 4 | Expedition Alton Towers

[Music] welcome you have been designated for Olivia four years after the opening of one of the best roller coasters in the world Alton Towers was looking for its next big hit and they found it with secret weapon for or oblivion what you are about to see will prepare you physically and psychologically for the most intense ride experience ever devised [Music] the world's first vertical drop roller coaster at Alton Towers long ago in the heart of England there was a beautiful house called Alton Towers it was owned by a rich ill and was said to be the finest house in the kingdom [Music] this ride is perfectly safe everything has been designed for your comfort and enjoyment if this ride is so safe why is it called oblivion in 1997 guests visit in the fantasy world section of the park found all of its rights relocated except for the black hole and instead were greeted by a huge construction site we have no announcement on what was to come that only hint was a few banners stating world's first ride opens March 1998 throughout the 1997 season huge amounts of dirt were excavated from the fantasy world area created a huge hole that kept getting deeper and deeper guests visiting looked on as nothing had been announced but something was being constructed clear the area please [Music] please patrol in the construction walls a secretive employee wearing an orange outfit and hardhat on the radio with an unknown person reporting the status of the area as a security guard for the construction when asked they ignored all questions about what was coming and told people looking into the site to move on clear the area please this shady individual was the first part of setting up the femen not just for the upcoming new ride but the whole new land it will reside in Alton Towers would use this secrecy with the construction clearly visible in the parks a hype of its brand-new ride before it was even announced the ride it south will cost 12 million pound and be built by B and M as the first dive coaster in the world with Alton Towers planning permission restricts tree hi once again they would dig down to create the rights most unique element the ride would only reach a high of 65 feet but his total drop would be 180 feet using the uneven terrain of the area to its advantage and dropping directly into a tunnel or Wow oblivion the trench dug for the drop was so large half of the right stroke would in fact be underground in this massive tunnel what it is the ride in essence is a very simple proposition because it's the world's first vertical drop roller coaster and that sounds fairly scary but it's sort of technically incredibly challenging there's a lot of instances in the world at the moment where coasters have got sort of fairly steep drops but there are no coasters where it literally goes completely vertical as the 1997 season continued the arrival of track and sports on the site gave the first hint of what was coming this though was the first of its kind and nothing like it had been seen before engineered by Bolliger & Mabillard the dive coaster began development in 1994 because of the weight of each vehicle the right track had to be much larger than the standard B&M models to support this weight rather than a long train as usual it will be a short two row vehicle with eight riders per row offering stadium-style seating to try and give each rider that front-row view we interrupt the procedure to bring you an oblivion report a few moments ago we were informed that a write car has disappeared right car 2 began its descent and doesn't appear to have come out of the other side what is baffling experts is that there is no crush seat there is no car there are no survivors there is nothing as marketing continued to trickle out during the late 1997 season at Christmas a unique Christmas card was released was Santa's sleigh being pulled out vertically secret weapon for would also be one of the first rites at the resort that would use his own dedicated internet promotion with a special site just for Oblivion the ride was finally announced in early 1998 a marked him for the ride was huge and it became a uk-wide success before I'd even open everybody had heard of oblivion and it had its own brand of deodorant featured on cereal boxes and also featured on news and TV shows such as Blue Peter specifically against you we need to throw down an irresistible challenge to single adults to clearly clearly communicate the Ryan's USP facedown free-falling and the terrifying intensity of that experience the Wrights image was everything early on the commercial for the ride was planned to be mysterious and confusing set inside the blackness of a Hercules plane with a man strapped to the inside of the loading ramp he began to slide towards the edge before his feet just managed to hook onto the ribbon of the ramp before asking the question what's it like to fall into oblivion the ride vehicle then forced towards the screen showing the logo with the words world first face first sheer drop focus groups found the advert confusing though and didn't understand the use of the plane in the end the commercial would have no metaphor fallen but lots of right shots created in the studio as the write was not yet completed it did feature the words though that would become entwined with the right don't look down we advise you not to look down but be warned if you do choose to close your eyes this may be taken as a sign by your friends that you have no bottle the whole area around oblivion including the black hole would be reefing to acceptor a sinister futuristic government facility with a military fill next year this is going to look like a sinister forbidden place and no one can really work out what it's all about you know there's always a place sort of a few miles away that's got a barbed wire fence around it and a minefield and you know people that work there and they never tell you what they do and it's all a bit sinister and a bit secret well that's one of these places and there's something going on underground the fairground theme from before was completely gone and a new dark area emerged the rice queue line would feature briefing videos with actor Renny Crowe Pinsky as a sinister man surrounded by darkness who explains in detail the physical and psychological effects of writing on oblivion the maximum g-force experienced on oblivion is 4.5 gene this is not drastic enough to experience a gray out a blackout or even a readout but it may be enough for some people to experience what is known as a cop-out based on facts about the ride the manner they are presented really creates a sense of dread well wait and support this mysterious man who in pre-production was named the Lord of Darkness will maintain that this ride is perfectly safe this ride is perfectly safe everything has been designed for your comfort and enjoyment the world's first vertical drop roller coaster threefold straight down you'll just get to the edge and that's it you don't see what's coming you don't know what's down there and you may not be coming back just sit back and enjoy the experience you're nearly at the point of no return hasta la vista baby good night Vienna get out now right you still can have a pleasant trip the queue line videos really did do an amazing job of making you feel anxious before you bought it as the cars dispatch there is one final appearance from the Lord of Darkness welcome to the unknown welcome to eternal darkness welcome [Music] after climbing the 65 feet very steep lift hill the ride would slowly move around the curve track on a unique chain system before slowly tipping over the edge [Music] the brake system at the top of the drop would hold the vehicle at a 45 degree angle in place for around three seconds though this amount of time could vary while here in the words don't look down the vehicles released and riders plummeted down the vertical drop into darkness while marketed and accepted as the world's first vertical drop the drop is in fact not quite vertical since Oblivion's wheels had not spring-loaded like later dive coasters the drop is actually 87 degrees this keeps the wheels in contact with the tractor in the descent and creates a smoother ride while transitioning back to horizontal within the tunnel later versions of the dive coaster do have spring-loaded wheels and feature a true vertical drop longer roids you know oblivion would be the shortest ride built by BN m at 1222 feet long its main feature being the world's first drop into the tunnel before a bank turn returns the right of the station lasted just 1 minute and 15 seconds despite the short ride though there is something special about staring right down the drop into darkness and fog oblivion opened on March 14th 1998 to huge success and huge media coverage guests ran straight to the brand new area and took their first ride into oblivion after queues of around three hours with it being one of the highest capacity right at the resort the ride was known throughout the UK and the marketing plan had been a success while Olten had used their treeline restriction to create some of the most unique roller coasters in the world it would be noise that were causing the next issue don't know down the ropers home is situated around 100 yards from the entrance to Alton Towers and have continuously challenged the park over the noise from of em in 1968 they moved into their home when Alton Towers was little more than a small fairground in an estate since then they have objected to plans for each and every new roller coaster after looking into taking the park to court since 1998 in 2004 the couple began a legal battle with Alton Towers over the noise levels from the park stating that if you live within a mile of Wharton towers your windows literally would shape from the park they cited the screams from oblivion fireworks each year and concerts were disrupt in their life surprisingly they won the case and a restriction was placed on noise levels singly now oblivion is the main culprit it resulted in the removal of the don't look down message that was played when hanging over the top the judge ruled the use of speakers to display the message induced increased screamin on the right Alton Towers were fined five thousand pound and served with a noise abatement order over the years the Rope has continued to try and take Alton Towers to court again claiming the noise was too high and claim compensation backed in 1998 each time after though the case was thrown out and ironically spending more money trying to take Orton's house to court than they actually gained in 2011 the area around the right was redone to add its new sponsor Fanta with hideous posters and sponsorships around the area before complaints eventually got them removed in 2013 with the opening of the smiler it was repainted as a new world's first Kota to join acceptor the Q line videos were also slightly modify to only show portions of them oblivion though remains mostly the same since opening over 21 years ago something explanation there is no way out there is no happy ending to this story oblivion might not be the biggest or longest dive coaster in the world now or even feature any inversions but there's something special about standing right in front of the tunnel as it dives down in front of you into the unknown I would say that the drop into the tunnel is still a most impressive original dive coaster element ever built and creates a sense of fear not found in other versions I suppose for some people it will be fairly terrifying dive cases have either love or hate fanbase and the ride relies heavily on that one aspect currently 13 dive coasters of people around the world by bnm including a sister coaster at garland in Italy called oblivion the black hole and the almost identical diving machine g5 in Taiwan I have been on five of them with my six and tallest in the world to be there soon to open Yukon striker at Canada's Wonderland the drop on the first version though still makes a unique and foreboding experience and when opening was talked about all over the UK for 21 years now it really has been terrifying to look down into oblivion thank you so much for watching this episode of expedition Alton Towers if you enjoyed it make sure you subscribe to join the expedition what is your number one dive cases that you have been on let me know in the comments below follow us on Twitter and Instagram for updates on upcoming expeditions and check out our store to get your own expedition patch logo t-shirt of your favorite part a special thank you to our patreon for supporting the channel and we will see you next time how would you compare the Alton Towers experience to the Disney experience I'd say the Alton Towers is very much a UK theme park it's a UK interpretation of magic it's delivered in an alternate ours kind of way Disney are very good at what they do but in many ways it's quite different to what we do we have a reputation for offering something for all the family but when it comes to the big rides for instance we have a reputation for being real innovators and offering very thrilling very exciting rides in that respect Disney don't tend to do that their rides aren't as white-knuckle aren't don't quite have the edge of some of our rides [Music]

Channel: Expedition Theme Park

Views: 614,919

Keywords: expedition theme park, oblivion, alton towers, expedition alton towers, x sector, smiler, black hole, dive coaster, vertical drop, world's first, worlds first, uk theme parks, uk rollercoasters, shiekra, barron 1898, yukon striker, merlin, alton, towers, secret weapon 4

Id: WXSMR8GZxJc

Length: 15min 24sec (924 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 05 2019