Flashback!

Flashback! is a steel boomerang roller coaster located at Six Flags Over Texas in Arlington, Texas (USA). The coaster consists of a single track that loops several times and then goes backward, making it a shuttle coaster.

It was one of the first Boomerang coasters built in the United States. It was designed and built by Vekoma and opened at Six Flags Over Texas in the 1989 season. Vekoma then built a generic boomerang model that had been sold to numerous amusement parks in the United States including Knott's Berry Farm, Hersheypark, Lake Compounce, as well as virtually all the parks owned by Funtime and Premier Parks. Premier Parks bought Funtime in 1995 and bought out Six Flags in 1998.

While the coaster is exactly the same in all the parks it was installed at in the 1990s, the Flashback! at Six Flags Over Texas has a slightly different layout with somewhat larger and heavier trains. But the concept of this looping shuttle coaster influenced the more generic boomerang coaster located in so many parks today.

Design and operation

The ride begins when the train is pulled backwards from the station and up a lift hill, before being released. After being released, the train passes through the station, enters a Cobra roll element (referred to as a boomerang by the designers), then travels through a vertical loop. Upon exiting the loop, the train runs up a second lift hill, which is angled so that the two lifts meet at the top in a "V"-like formation. Once out of...
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