Volume 3, No. 19. October 10,2003
New Arrivals
In
the nursery
Other recent New Arrivals.
It’s a 4D film!
Seaworld had fun 4-D. The Gold Coast, Australia, marine theme
park was showing the Pirates film in its 400-seat theater that
was neither clever enough nor befitting its setting to please the park’s
management. So, they replaced it September 20, 2003, with Planet
SOS, produced by Ben Stassen and nWave Productions
for the World Wildlife Fund. The 12-minute film takes guests through
three ecologically challenged regions: the polar cap threatened by global warming,
a coral reef threatened by reckless fishing practices and a tropical rainforest
threatened by habitat destruction. Along the way guests get sneezed on by a
polar bear, caught in a drag net and feel the chainsaws coming. “It’s
very thought-provoking; we’re very pleased with it,” said Steve Peet,
chief operating officer for Warner Village Theme Park Group which includes Seaworld.
The park supplemented the main film with a 2 1/2-minute introductory
movie filmed aboard the park’s own marine research and rescue craft Seaworld
I and narrated by the park’s Director of Marine Sciences Trevor Long.
“It’s a nice way to do a little flag waving for what we do at Seaworld,”
Peet said. It fits the film Planet SOS, which, in turn fits the setting
of Seaworld.
It’s a whirlpool10!
Wet ‘n’ Wild in Gold Coast, Australia, decided to get
double use out of its new Whirlpool water ride. For the spring,
summer and fall, the ride designed and built by Wet ‘n’ Wild’s
own creative team, is a 25-meter/82 feet whirlpool containing a 10-meter-wide/33
foot-wide bubbling channel through which guests whirl about in one- or two-person
rafts. For the winter months, the channel is drained to the bottom and the lids
come off of ten 1.5-meter/5-foot hot tubs able to hold 20 people
each. “Depending on weather conditions the 20-person tub has grown to 31,”
said Steve Peet, chief operating officer for Warner Village Theme Park Group
which includes Wet ‘n’ Wild. That group of 31 was a visiting rugby
union team, among the many guests who enjoyed the hot tubs this past winter
before the whirlpool officially opened as Whirlpool September 20,
2003. “It was a very ambitious project,” Peet said. “We built
our own models, did our own testing. We probably discovered a lot of hydraulic
science that we didn’t know existed. It’s amazing all the different
dynamics trying to get water to do what you want it to do.”
THE LOOP is written and produced by Eric Minton, Minton Enterprises, LLC. To see more examples of Eric Minton's work and Minton Enterprises services, visit www.ericminton.com.
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