Twists, turns, flips and fun

People of all ages enjoy the rides, one operator says.
By MARALINE KUBIK
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
CANFIELD -- Fast and furious -- and upside down.
Thrill-seekers' favorite amusements offer wild rides.
"I had to hold on for my life!" announced Kayla Houck, 8, a third-grader at Reynolds Elementary School in Transfer, Pa. She was bopping through the crowd to meet her parents after an exhilarating ride on The Screamer, which rocked her and 15 others back and forth, then up and around, allowing them to dangle upside down for just a moment.
"I'll never go on that again; it's too scary," the girl said, clutching her hands to her chest.
Ordinarily, her mom or dad rides with her. "But this spins too much," said her mom, Carol.
"Plus, we just had an elephant ear," added her dad, Dan.
Having just eaten didn't bother Kayla a bit, and her pronouncement that she wouldn't ride The Screamer again was hard to believe given her enthusiastic smile.
On a roll
Before getting in line for The Zipper, Brandi Brown, 15, and Michelle Ellis, 13, rode The Screamer three or four times; the Ring of Fire, which also turned them upside down, four times; and the Round-Up, which uses centrifugal force to pin standing riders against the spinning, circular cage as it tilts, laying riders on their backs, sides and face down.
The Zipper, their favorite ride, flips and spins riders upside down again and again as the cages they ride in travel up and around, over and over.
Three times wasn't nearly enough for the two girls. "We're gonna go on it again and again," said Brandi, a sophomore at Salem High School, as she and Michelle, a seventh-grader at Salem Middle School, waited in line for another turn.
"Top Gun's the best," according to Allen Brainard, 13, an eighth-grader at Girard High School.
Top Gun, which Allen rode twice, is similar to The Screamer.
Allen also rode three times on the Glider, in which riders lie on their stomachs in kitelike gliders, and once on the Ring of Fire.
"I'll never ride Ring of Fire again. It was freaky. I was scared," he added.
Allen; his 10-year-old sister, Katie, a fifth-grader at Girard Elementary; and their friend, Kelsey Hoover, 13, also a Girard eighth-grader, like a lot of the rides. But some of the lines were too long, said Beverly Hoover, Kelsey's mom, who watched the kids from the midway.
"I don't get on the rides," she said. "I get sick watching them."
Popular attraction
Dozens of eager riders waited in line for a turn on Downdraft, a ride with passenger cars on the end of long arms that lift and drop as the entire ride spins.
"Little ones, big ones, old people -- they all like to ride. Downdraft is a lot of kids' favorite," said Bill DeRosa of Cleveland, who's worked as a ride operator the last three years.
Brady Legan and Coltan Bane, both 9-year-old fourth-graders from West Virginia, don't choose their rides according to how wild it is but how long the line is.
The Inverter, which turned the boys and more than a dozen other riders on their heads, was their first ride "because no one was in line," Brady said.
Nathaniel Tinney, another 9-year-old from West Virginia, wouldn't ride The Inverter with his friends.
"I throw up," he explained.
"He's scared," countered Coltan.
Nathaniel didn't reply to his friend's assessment.
kubik@vindy.com