A Blast From The Past - Patent For Stand-up Restraint

On September 16th, 1986 Giovanola Freres SA of Monthey Switzerland, along with Intamin AG of Freienbach Switzerland filed a patent for a device to retain roller coaster passengers in a standing position.

The abstract reads: To enable a passenger to ride a "roller coaster" in a standing position, the invention device includes a seat placed between the legs of the passenger, a back member with a headrest incorporated in it, and two harnesses which provide retention of the passenger from above as well as lateral retention of his head and good front and lateral retention of his body.

One of the harnesses is movable and can be swung upwardly to enable easy acess to the subject device by the passenger and to enable a ventral bar to be brought into tight contact with the passenger's abdomen before being locked shut in that position.

Because the sliding carriage which bears the two harnesses, the back member and the seat are displaceable and lockable along the cloumns which have their base fixed to the chassis of the train, the present invention can accommodate passengers of differnt height and sizes and reliably retain such passengers regardless of their orientation in space during the operation of the associated roller coaster.

If this description isn't painfull enough to read, the restraint was used on the much traveled Batman The Escape at Astroworld which is currently in storage at Darien Lake, Cobra at La Ronde and Iron Wolf at Six Flags Great America