The Bat (Kings Island) - April, 1981 full-circuit POV / TV advert 

I felt like I could almost hear the ride tearing itself apart, especially when it hit some of those turns

I'm surprised someone was able to film this in full without it breaking down.

The camera quality is surprisingly good for early 1980's tech and although it is no longer in operation closing after an embarrassingly short 3 seasons it still looks like fun and you can kinda hear it dismantling as it proceeds

Wow, this ride looks like it was insane. Just look at how extreme the swinging was on some of the turns! You can definitely tell this was a prototype, especially when you read about all the technical problems it had. Looks like it was a hell of a ride.

Wow this is legendary. Back in a time when recording like this was rare you actually get to see something that doesn't exist anymore. The sounds of the chains the metal gosh I love roller coasters it's so sad to see one go.

I love how people say "Oh The Bat is still at Kings Island." No this is The Bat people. They renamed Flight Deck/Top Gun. This was located where Vortex is now.

As a teen in the early 80s I absolutely loved this ride. It was so problematic though and a trip to the park was always a gamble if you'd be able to ride or if it was "temporarily closed" Oh the memories!

The TV commercial was fantastic. Why can't they make commercials that cool anymore?

Thanks for sharing this. It's hard enough to find pictures of The Bat, let alone a POV video.

I remember riding this. It was my favorite at Kings Island back then. I would of never known he had mechanical problems. It was SO MUCH fun.

Ten years before Batman: the Ride at Six Flags Great America opened (1992), we had The Bat at Kings Island. I consider these Arrow Dynamics suspended coasters to be the ancestors to the Bolliger & Mabillard inverted coasters we have today. It makes me wish that the roller coaster companies of today would remake the rides of yesteryear for future generations to come... If only the parks respect their elder coasters more (e.g. Big Bad Wolf at Busch Gardens Williamsburg, VA)

I am so glad I got to ride this several times before it was closed for good. I was very lucky and I loved this ride! The rumors out there saying that there was people killed on the Bat are false! The ride had many technical problems due to the fact that it was a prototype and very first of its kind. They learned from the mistakes of this type of ride to be able to make future ride types. The big problems the original Bat had was non-banking of the stressful curves on the shock absorbers and also the braking fins installed on the bottom of the trains. The ride experienced cracks in the steel track, the wheels and the brake fins made the ride too stressful on the actual wheels on the track above. This ride really was a great ride but a maintenance nightmare! Also a very costly rollercoaster to try and operate! It was fun while it was here! It would be nice if they could get a new "Bat" that could be very similar to the original that wouldn't be too costly to operate.....,..

man this coaster looked wild...I've heard the stories..did you hear the way that thing slammed into that second lift hill...I'm good lol

The only time I got to ride this was right after it had been raining. We were lucky enough to get the front seats! But, as luck would also have it, the design of the rail made ALL of the water that had settled on the rail be pushed off right into the front seats as it started on its journey, which was a downpour onto my head, making my Farrah Fawcett hair plaster over my eyes. For the whole ride I couldn’t see a dang thing! Whoever videotaped this, thank you so much! We thought we would ride it again because of our season passes, but every time we tried the ride was “temporarily closed”. Awesome ride, so sad they couldn’t work the bugs out of the original Bat!

Those outrageous swings! The later models don't go that high!

I rode it July of 83 shortly before it shut down to riders permanently. The thing I remember that scared me was when the trains would swing you would hear an unsettling squeaking sound. I thought it was thrilling but honestly I didn’t want to ride it again because it felt very unsafe. Probably shocking that nobody ever was seriously injured or worse on it. I remember the day that I rode it that it did have a couple of of periods of mechanical downtime.

Love it! I'm stating to think those unbanked turns were intentional. Like they new the ride would be more insane with less banked turns, but probably didn't realize how stressful it would be on the ride

1:05, 1:09 1:13 (especially) 2:07 2:10 - Nice clear reasons why The Bat was truly a learning experience for Arrow... yikes! Glad they learned to bank the turns!

It really did slam against the stops. Uncomfortable but fun. Seems I remember it being down a lot. Being a "first" they learned a lot about hanging coasters.

Thank you for posting this! This is the first full POV of the bat I've seen!

I rode it 3 times during a grad night during '83...I remember at one point they had to replace some wheels while we were in line....but kept it going. It was a great ride while it lasted.

This ride was down more than it was running. They put steel tie-downs on the track to keep the track from rocking back and forth, after the track broke. The shocks on it were replaced constantly. I think it cost too much to maintain. It was fun though. Swung high, and was exciting!

Very lucky to have ridden it during two of its short lived seasons. Love the Zodiac double wheel in the background too! Oh how I miss classic Kings Island...

I remember riding that with dad in the 80’s. Thank you for bringing back a good memory

Thank you so much for uploading this! Ive been looking for it for 2 years! You are awesome!

Awesome man, thanks for posting! It's crazy how much the cars would swing.

I've read about this ride for years, but this is my first time seeing it. It looks absolutely insane, I'm amazed that passed any kind of inspection. I also never realized it had two lift hills. In retrospect, Arrow sure made a lot of bad decisions.

This ride was awesome! I rode it more times than I can count back in the early 80s and was on one of the last rides at the end of July of 1983. Yeah, it had its problems. But it was still a million times better than that pathetic excuse for a ride they call "The Bat" today.

Brings back some memories. I was barely 10 when I first rode it so it's nice to see it again. Lines were ridiculous. I rode it a few visits the first and second years, but after that it always seemed to be shut down, until they finally removed it.

When the ride hit the break run in this POV, that jolt and bang was actually one of the break fins not being alined and snapping off 😂

Still better than Vortex...

this looks absolutely fucking insane, wow, everybody that got to the chance to ride this i envy you

Thanks for sharing that man! Never got to ride it. 81-85 dude?! Soooo cool.

I rode this a kid in the rear car. I was scared. After watching this video, it brought back some memories. However, seeing it slam against the stops in the two right turns worries me. Thankfully nobody really was injured badly on this thing. The track should have been banked too.

Thank you for making this video!!!

I rode it. Don't remember the exact year, but it was wild because you just didn't see these types of rides back then. I believed all those tall tales that somebody died on The Bat for the longest time until I got internet and did my own research. haha

My dad went to KI in 1983, saw this ride but they were doing the dreaded maintenance on it.

if only they banked the turns, it may have survived it they did

for years I was wanting to see what the bat looked like! thank you so much! :)

Ouch @ 1:12 and again at 2:10! I see why they removed it.

A maintenance nightmare, but an awesome ride. Got to ride it in 1982.

That's crazy! It would bang and try to swing passed what the chassis allows! Thank you for posting this

Wheres the bank turns😁 As for the comments saying that it sounds likes its being torn apart. The speed the cars are going arount flat banked turns is causing the train to swing so high that each car is hitting a stopper preventing the train from swinging too far. Thats the noise your hearing

I wanted to ride this so badly as a kid but I just wasn't tall enough. I went again a year or two later and the Bat was gone :(

Thank you for sharing this gem!

Just amazing to see this video!. I rode this with my dad in 81 when I was 7. First year I was tall enough to get on everything. I remember it stopped on the second hill for a few seconds, severely creeping me out due to all the press about the breakdowns.

I never got to ride it when I was little. Now it’s like I did! Thanks!

That looked fun but the new bat is fun I really like the ad for it

I like how there was a single "woah!" when that brake fin snapped and then silence

next year will be the 40th anniversary of the original bats opening

Worth pointing out that this was the intensity in the front. Can only imagine the back car going through those turns with even more speed.

My dad got to ride this. Forever envious

I remember this commercial.

Not to mention the brakes are on the bottom of the train and the wheels are above the train. You can see how much the whole train and structure shudders when the train hits the final brake run. The Bat, in a way, was a prototype for future inverted coasters. This ride looks so fantastic and bad at the same time.

what an amazing ride. if only it worked

I did not expect the cars to swing that much!

Flight Deck has now been renamed THE BAT and has a change of colors!

Rode it in early July, 1983. That's the last season it operated. They used new trains that year but still had problems. I believe in 84 it stood but never operated. Wasn't fast but the swings were pretty wild.

Ive never seen a swing so hard that it overbanks. Good god that thing was crazy.

at the end u can hear someone talk about how much it hurt (2:27 ?)

Gawd I miss this coaster! This was way better than that stupid top gun flight deck! Its a shame because the non banking this coaster had . You can clearly see the stress the trains had operating on this track. I was lucky to ride this about 20 or so times! It was down quite a bit but I got lucky and it would open when we would be in the area and we got on before it broke down again. What a shame, a great coaster with awesome trains!

The Vortex occupies the same space the Bat once did. The building or station house was designed for the bat. Once the Bat was scrapped due to too much daily maintenance the station house was left and the vortex built in the same space. check KI extreme.com for some more info on this.

2:10 Ow...

Wicked vid! and oh my word you can even see/feel/hear the brake fins on the bottom of the car smacking the pre station brakes cause the train wasn't aligned perfect with the brakes.

What's with the guys standing right by the track at the end? You'd never see that today!

I was 3 months old when this ride opened...damn I'm getting old.

The vortex is in its place now RampGuy1

kings island has re-named "top gun/flight deck" "the bat". getting all retro. plus, it is just pretty much a "perfected" version of the original bat anyway.

This entire ride is like the last two turns on Eagle Fortress.

The tv advert kinda reminds me of the laser disc arcade game Dragon's Lair.

I rode the Bat!!!!!

This was the only Arrow Suspended that I’m aware of to have the classic Arrow anti rollback sound.

That looks more fun than the one we have now these days only if it was painted though like the bat we have now ;)

I was one of the lucky ones to get to ride the original the first year it opened..It was awesome! Wish the Flight Deck was laid out the same way.I have never ridden Flight Deck,but always wondered why they just didn't name it "The Bat" to start with. This was the scariest coaster I had ever ridden,and even scarier at night! It was so awesome!

I was too small ride ride the bay but o remember when they took it out and put Vortex in.

The 1st of anything is going to be problematic.have to give them respect, they opened the door to some of the great rides we have now

I Rode the Vortex yesterday, and I found a foot of one of the sole surviving concrete blocks where a rail of the Original ride was once held in place. I spotted it while I was in line for it. Here is a link to the picture in question, which will be the 11th image in the post: m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=2394436794108435&id=100006264135284&sfnsn=cl

I see what the problem was with this ride. Almost no banking of the track led to terrible stress fractures on the track and on the trains themeselves. I can't believe how much those cars swayed on some of those curves. Intense.

Only got to ride it once, but it was a great ride. Miss The Bat.

Good gawd this thing looks violent. Never thought I'd see a POV in my lifetime, thanks for sharing it. Where did you get it anyway? Is it the POV that was filmed for commercials or is it just a coasterfan with a large pocket? Because if this is amateur footage the cameraman figured out stabilization on Arrow coasters 3 decades before everyone else.

Later generations of suspended coasters have almost no swinging at all. The track banks up either left or right and the wheel assembly follows while the car stays close to 90 degrees of the wheel assembly. They re-engineered the "swinging coaster" so it doesn't really swing. hahahahaha

Thanks for the great memories.

Wow, this came out the same year I was born. I was always curious about it, but of course, never got the chance to ride it. The next hanging rollercoaster Kings Island built was Top Gun, where Paramount basically pooh-poohed on the very concept with such a weak ride. :(

I'm seeing fluids fall, and wondering if that should be a concern

2:23 What is THAT?

Did the Vortex take the place of this? The loading and unloading area it pulls into looks like the old Vortex loading area??

open and up and down and swing and stop and up and down and swing and left and right and close and tear and scrapped and gone

I got to ride it in June of 1981. we got lucky as it was always down.. I know this ride to be father to many undertrack coasters like the Iron Dragon at Cedar Point..

is that vortexs old train house?

i used to work at kings island circa 2011. when cedar fair bought kings island from paramount they had to rename certain movie named rides including faceoff n tombraider n topgun. topgun is now flight deck...flight deck is not the bat...its just topgun with a new name.

i wish that kinda bat was still there but its not so rest in peace that bat 1981-1983 and in 1987 vortex got put there but they brought bat back because they renamed the ride top gun bat so they brung the bat back to kings island but kings island is removing the vortex so rest in peace vortex 1987-2019

The lack of banked turns caused it to swing violently

At 1:13 it looks quite rough going around those bends. I'm glad it was only a prototype. Looks like you could have got injured on the original Bat. Glad nobody did get injured during it's run for only a few seasons.

As a kid I was so terrified of this thing and the accident rumors...I never rode it. I watch this video and think.. my God, that's a slow rough pos

That looked awsome

1:29 you can just hear the pain from the chain lift 😬😬😬

How did you take this in the years it was like dis- And posted it in 2013-?

They have now just like this lol like they could be twins.. It was called flight deck and it was changed to "the bat" for the 2014 season lol. Kings island is only 15 minutes from my house. I'm there everyday.

I heard they're rebuilding it for 2014, from the Kings Island FB page.

The bat must comeback when the banshee comes out! Its a perfect fit!