Systems and de Bie admits it was the highest priority. The ride system is designed with four levels of emergency air supply redundancy. “We applied our history of SeaTREK and its redundant systems to the Aquaticar ride system,” adds de Bie. “The machinery space has three levels of automatically engaged air supply redundancy – each level is sufficient to rotate a full complement of vehicles from start to finish.” The final redundancy is an onboard air cylinder that can be engaged by lifeguards to provide an additional 27 minutes of air. “Keep in mind the underwater ride time is about five minutes,” says de Bie. “Lastly, not included in the above is the option to inflate lift bags on the ride vehicle to raise the vehicle to a floating position. Staff can then manoeuvre the vehicle to planned ‘bail out’ shelves along the ride course.” Loss of air is, of course, the main safety concern. “Also, human nature/human behavioural response, which is out of our control,” de Bie says. “There is nothing restraining the guest in the ride vehicle. We’ve focused a lot on emergency response scenarios in our Standard Operating Procedures and our case studies for our ride design risk assessment. Ride operators and lifeguards also complete a rigorous training course and conduct regular practice drills for these emergency response scenarios.” The ride system includes on-board CCTV cameras, several underwater cameras and cameras in the station. This video is livestreamed to an operator console for monitoring. The system has received TUV approval and certification. Each ride vehicle also has a two-way call button where the operator and the passengers can communicate with each other. They also have the ability to remove one of the passenger seat posts so that the ride vehicle can accommodate a wheelchair rolled onto the car, thereby making this a more accessible ride experience. “A core company value is to make the underwater world accessible, and this would only further advance our mission,” says de Bie. Although the ride is fairly new, it’s quickly gaining traction. Aquaticar: Legend of the Glowing Guardian was recently honoured with several prestigious industry awards. De Bie tells me there are also other exciting projects in development, and the company is currently building its second Aquaticar ride system, with the location to be shared in the near future. Aquaticar 2.0 is set to be a “gamified” version, and Sub Sea Systems has recently developed a Bubble Pulse Gun (BPG) that shoots high-speed toroid vortices (O-ring bubbles). Passengers will be able to shoot BPGs mounted to the front grab bar at underwater targets. “We also initially designed the system for salt water (suitable for salt or fresh water). We’d love to see a ride experience with marine life,” de Bie says.
depth of nine feet. The attraction features a glowing lost city filled with mythical creatures, LED screens and immersive audio-visual effects that are triggered by shark-fin antennae on the cars. Although the vehicles self-steer along the course, the initial ride design enabled passengers to steer. However, that concept was scrapped in the design process along the way. The vehicle utilises a breathing canopy to keep ride passengers dry from about mid-chest up and breathing normally through their nose and mouth. This large cavity of air has tremendous uplift force underwater (500lbs/227kg), so this has to be counterbalanced with weight in order to keep the ride vehicles travelling along the underwater track. “Each vehicle weighs approximately 1580lbs/717kg on land! Determining that weight balance – sufficient to keep the car down, but not too much to affect speed – was tricky.” A particularly quirky and unique feature are the air bubbles that power the cars. “My dad, Jim Mayfield, president and CEO of Sub Sea Systems, has also been captivated by the power of air bubbles underwater,” admits de Bie. “A lot of people don’t realise the energy in an air bubble as it tries to escape the pressure
of the water column and rise to the surface. Jim wanted to harness this energy to use it to power an underwater ride system. Combine the two – shared experience underwater and bubble power – and Aquaticar was born!” The ride vehicle also features two large rotors at the rear of the car. Each rotor is designed with large scoops organised around a central hub. As the vehicle travels along the course, it mechanically engages an air register that releases a set flow of air beneath the car. “That air is captured in an air box and redirected to replenish the air in the breathing canopy and also to the two rotors,” says de Bie. “As the scoops in the rotors capture the air bubbles, the air wants to escape to the surface. This force turns the rotors and releases the air at about the 12 o’clock position (like a water wheel in reverse).” The rotors are connected to a rear-wheel chain drive, and this is how the vehicles are propelled forward. “We worked through and tested many prototypes of the rotor-scoop design. We needed to maximise the reach of the scoops as the rotor turned before the air escaped so that we could harness the full power of that uplift force.” With the ride being completely underwater, safety was always a concern for Sub Sea
GOING DOWN The Aquaticar ride at Aquarabia in Saudi Arabia makes the
underwater accessible to everyone
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