Zoomerang has been flinging riders backwards over Lake Compounce since 1997 — and in true fashion for America’s oldest continuously operating amusement park, even this off-the-shelf thrill machine carries a genuine piece of coaster history. The Bristol, Connecticut park’s Vekoma Boomerang was the first anywhere to receive trains designed by Vekoma itself, ending the era of Arrow Dynamics-built rolling stock on the world’s most-cloned coaster model.
Key Stats
| Type | Vekoma Boomerang (steel shuttle coaster) |
| Opened | June 27, 1997 |
| Height | 116.5 ft (35.5 m) |
| Track length | 935 ft (285 m) |
| Top speed | 47 mph (76 km/h) |
| Inversions | 3 (cobra roll + vertical loop, ridden both ways) |
| Ride time | 1:48 |
| Max g-force | 5.2 g |
| Capacity | 760 riders per hour |
| Height requirement | 48 in (122 cm) |
History
Zoomerang opened on June 27, 1997, giving Lake Compounce — a park founded in 1846 — a modern inverting steel coaster to pair with its classic wooden rides. Its claim to fame in the industry is subtle but real: earlier Boomerangs ran trains built by Arrow Dynamics, and Zoomerang was the first of the breed delivered with Vekoma’s own train design. After a decade of New England weather wore down the original paint, the ride was repainted in September 2007 in its current purple-track, teal-support color scheme.
Ride Experience
The 28-passenger train is winched backwards up the first of two 116-foot lift hills, which lean diagonally toward one another over the midway. After a slow thirty-second climb the train drops, hitting 47 mph as it tears through the station and into the cobra roll — a double inversion that squeezes riders with up to 5.2 g — then around the vertical loop and up the second spike. The second lift hauls it higher, holds, and releases: the entire 935-foot course runs again in reverse, through the loop, back through the cobra roll and the station, before the train settles home. Three inversions each direction, six per ride.
How It Stacks Up
Zoomerang’s 5.2 g peak rivals coasters three times its size — context on our highest g-force coasters list — even though its 116.5-foot spikes sit far below the tallest coasters in the world. In June 2001, a sensor fault famously stranded a train 60 feet up in the low point of the cobra roll; firefighters walked all 26 passengers down without injury, and the coaster has kept looping ever since.
FAQ
How fast is Zoomerang at Lake Compounce?
Top speed is 47 mph (76 km/h), reached both forward and backward as the train drops off the ride’s twin 116-foot spikes.
How many inversions does Zoomerang have?
Three — a two-part cobra roll and a vertical loop. Because the shuttle layout repeats in reverse, riders go upside down six times per cycle.
What makes Zoomerang historically notable?
It was the first Vekoma Boomerang fitted with Vekoma’s own train design; every earlier installation used trains from Arrow Dynamics.
Photo: Wildcat1 at English Wikipedia via Wikimedia Commons (Public domain)