Roller Coaster

When it opens next year, the Great Mall of China near Beijing will be the biggest retail and entertainment center in the world, with 15 million square feet of shops, a theme park, a water park — and the world's tallest indoor roller coaster, imported from Baltimore. The still-unnamed "super launch" coaster will be designed and built by Premier Rides, a company that specializes in roller coasters, water rides and other amusement park attractions. The mall's developer, the Berjaya Great Mall of China Co. Ltd., commissioned Premier to work on the project earlier this year after meeting the firm's president, Jim Seay, last June during a Maryland trade mission to China.

It's spring break for many students, and area amusement parks are ready to take visitors for a ride — up, down, sideways and backwards. Marylanders can take a day or weekend trip to one of these six theme parks, all within a few hours' drive of Baltimore. More than 300 million guests visit U.S. theme parks each year, and the recent economic downturn hasn't had a big effect on attendance, according to David Mandt, a spokesman for the International Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions.

A Trimper's amusement park roller coaster on the Ocean City boardwalk injured three people Thursday, a spokesman said. Ocean City Fire Department crews were called to the "Tidal Wave" ride, located at South 1st Street and South Baltimore Avenue for reports of a fire and people trapped at about 9:30 p.m., Steve Price, spokesman with the fire department. But after arriving to the scene, he said there was no fire and the ride was not stuck, but three people had suffered non-life-threatening injuries.

When it opens next year, the Great Mall of China near Beijing will be the biggest retail and entertainment center in the world, with 15 million square feet of shops, a theme park, a water park — and the world's tallest indoor roller coaster, imported from Baltimore. The still-unnamed "super launch" coaster will be designed and built by Premier Rides, a company that specializes in roller coasters, water rides and other amusement park attractions. The mall's developer, the Berjaya Great Mall of China Co. Ltd., commissioned Premier to work on the project earlier this year after meeting the firm's president, Jim Seay, last June during a Maryland trade mission to China.

Every summer, we spend one long day at Hersheypark with friends. As the designated date approaches, I convince myself that this year will be different - yes, this will be the year I recapture the childhood thrill of roller coasters without the weird adult aftershock of nausea. After all, the whole queasiness thing came on suddenly - why shouldn't it disappear just as abruptly? We get up early and arrive when the park opens, standing with the throngs of people filtering in through the entrance gate.

IT WAS NOT a sports year for the faint of heart. The highs were especially high in 2004, and the lows were particularly low. The Boston Red Sox pulled off the greatest comeback in major league postseason history, eliminated the New York Yankees and went on to break a World Series curse that had gripped them for 86 years. Sports doesn't get much more stirring. But less than a month later, fans and players violently brawled at an NBA game in Detroit. Has sports ever produced more disturbing images?

Look for the bunny hops. They guarantee plenty of air time.Twelve-year-old Carrie O'Brien translates: Bunny hops are the small jumps at the end of the roller coaster. "Air time means you sort of lift up off your seat," explains Carrie, who lives in Nashville and is an expert on the subject.She's ridden dozens of roller coasters around the country with her dad, Tim O'Brien, who covers amusement parks around the world for Amusement Business Newsweekly, the $6-billion-a-year industry's trade newspaper.

President Bush's tepid Rose Garden reassurances Friday that the government is addressing the economic crisis notwithstanding, Washington still hasn't tamed the Wall Street beast. Try as it might, the administration's combination of moves hasn't stopped the free-fall or lessened the fear gripping the nation's investors. The moves have been many, from interest rate cuts and the takeover of mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to the $700 billion rescue plan and last week's decision by the Federal Reserve to loan money directly to corporations.

NEW YORK - The Thunderbolt roller coaster, an aging relic of Coney Island's past, was demolished recently by the city, angering its owner, coaster aficionados and historic preservationists who made an 11th-hour attempt to save the structure. "I think it's just unbelievable," said Horace Bullard, who said he had owned the coaster since 1985. "We are going to court." But it is too late to save the Thunderbolt, a mass of wood and steel that for years has been overgrown with bushes and vines that literally pulled it apart.

Most people who ride roller coasters will not suffer brain injuries, but more research is needed before the popular amusement rides can be declared safe, according to a new study released in Washington last week. Findings of the study, commissioned by the Brain Injury Association of America, suggest the skull jostling that riders experience on roller coasters is more dangerous than the gravitational forces that some states seek to regulate. Gravitational forces, or g-forces, are the invisible force pushing down on riders as they are propelled through sharp turns and steep plunges.

Gilman's football players knew they faced an extra man when they met Archbishop Spalding in Friday afternoon's MIAA A Conference semifinal - the emotion the Cavaliers carried in trying to extend their season for coach Mike Whittles, who is battling stage four pancreatic cancer. The No. 9 Cavaliers moved the ball well on their opening drive, using up more than six minutes of clock, but they couldn't reach the end zone. Once the No. 1 Greyhounds got their hands on the ball, they were off and running, scoring the first 34 points en route to a 34-14 victory and a trip to the first A Conference championship game.

March 19, 2011 The Orioles' new shortstop, with the movie star looks and the West Coast ease, hasn't been hard to find the past four weeks. On most mornings, he turns his chair around at his corner locker and faces a roomful of new teammates. He interacts with fellow infielders, accepts challenges at the pingpong table and takes in the culture in his third big league clubhouse in as many years.This is J.J. Hardy in his element. This is also in stark contrast with the person he became seven years ago when a shoulder injury jeopardized a promising career before it had really even started.

C. Earl "Earl the Pearl" Tingstrom Jr., former owner of a Baltimore medical laboratory who enjoyed boating on the Chesapeake Bay, died Feb. 16 of a massive stroke at Stella Maris Hospice. He was 80. The son of a General Electric Corp. tool and dye maker and a seamstress, Mr. Tingstrom was born in Philadelphia. In 1932, his family moved to Curtis Bay, and he later grew up in Westport and Brooklyn. Mr. Tingstrom, who was known as "Earl the Pearl" by family and friends, was a 1949 graduate of Southern High School and Baltimore Junior College, where he met and fell in love with the former Catherine Evans, whom he married in 1954.

When Monique Bassett was in grade school near New Orleans, she would regularly scribble her personal goals on a sheet of notebook paper and tape them on her bedroom wall. Early on, her goals were directed mostly toward academics -- straight A's, perfect attendance and honor roll. When she reached junior high and developed a passion for basketball, a more long-term goal was posted: becoming a basketball coach. "I've always taken a lot of pride in the game," said Bassett, who played DivisionI ball at Bethune-Cookman.

One performance on "American Idol" can make anyone ubiquitous. Soon after Katharine McPhee sang KT Tunstall's single "Black Horse and the Cherry Tree" on the show in 2006, even soccer moms knew the words to the "woo hoo" song. You might have also heard her song "Suddenly I See" played over promos for "The Amazing Race" or opening the movie "The Devil Wears Prada," behind a montage of pretty girls and Anne Hathaway getting ready for work. In fact, even her label, Virgin Records, was getting tired of seeing her face, Tunstall says jokingly.

A Trimper's amusement park roller coaster on the Ocean City boardwalk injured three people Thursday, a spokesman said. Ocean City Fire Department crews were called to the "Tidal Wave" ride, located at South 1st Street and South Baltimore Avenue for reports of a fire and people trapped at about 9:30 p.m., Steve Price, spokesman with the fire department. But after arriving to the scene, he said there was no fire and the ride was not stuck, but three people had suffered non-life-threatening injuries.

The weather is blessedly humidity-free, the lines are surprisingly short and you're ready for a day full of barrel rolls, dog legs and headchoppers. Before you board that imposing and intriguing coaster, make sure you know what these and other terms mean. First, ask yourself these questions: 1) You just rode a launch coaster that made you experience negative Gs as you went over a camelback. What happened to you? A. You experienced weightlessness as a result of being flung at 80 mph over a series of small hills.

RICHFIELD, Ohio -- The swagger that carried him through collegiate stardom is gone now, replaced by almost a sad look. Once a mighty buck in the forest of intercollegiate athletics, Danny Ferry seems now more like a hopeful fawn trying to recover from a collision with the speeding car of great expectations."

I t certainly seemed improbable eight months ago, when the pain in Brad Bergesen's left shin was so intense that he would lie in bed at night in a cold sweat, feeling as if he were about to pass out. He didn't feel much better about his chances eight weeks before the start of spring training, when he couldn't throw a ball 50 feet without excruciating pain in his shoulder. But after months of dealing with pain and little progress, after one significant setback followed by a rapid recovery, Bergesen will emerge from the home dugout at 3:03 p.m. today, take his usual hop over the first base foul line and throw the 2010 season's first official pitch at Camden Yards against the Toronto Blue Jays.