The New World’s Tallest Roller Coaster: Tourism Inspired Engineering in Saudi Arabia

The world’s tallest, fastest, and longest roller coaster, Falcons Flight, recently opened at the brand new Six Flags Qiddiya City just outside of Riyaddh, Saudi Arabia. Six Flags Qiddiya City is a prime example of Saudi Arabia’s efforts in recent years to invest in tourism in an attempt to diversify their economy and not be completely reliant on oil [1]. This government initiated focus on tourism has inspired ambitious engineering projects which are dramatically transforming the desert nation into a major tourist destination, and Falcons Flight just might be the flashiest of these projects [2].

Figure 1: An aerial picture of Six Flags Qiddiya City [3].

Falcons Flight stands at 640 feet (195 meters) tall, goes 155.3 mph (250 kmh), and is 13,943.6 feet (4250 meters) long. To give you an idea of how preposterous these statistics are, the previous tallest roller coaster was 456 feet (139 meters) tall, the previous fastest roller coaster was 149.1 mph (240 kmh), and the previous longest roller coaster was 8133.2 feet (2480 meters) long [4]. This makes Falcons Flight 40% taller, 4% faster, and 71% longer than the previous record holders. The last roller coaster to break the height, speed, and length records at the same time when it opened was Screamin’ Eagle at Six Flags St. Louis, which opened in 1976 [5]. 

The ride experience on Falcons Flight is split into three parts. The first part starts with a modestly sized launched lift hill, a steep drop, and numerous twisted airtime hills. If the ride ended there, it would still be longer than a lot of roller coasters, but the second part is where things get crazy. The ride then launches riders to 100 mph in order to go up the side of a cliff and reach the highest point of the ride. It then does an outerbanked turn off the side of the cliff before stopping riders at a holding brake in anticipation of the last third.

Figure 2: The upwards launch, outer-banked turn, and cliff drop [5].

It then drops vertically off the cliff and then continues dropping through a tunnel when it hits the 155.3 mph downwards launch which propels riders over a 530 foot tall parabolic airtime hill. The rest of the ride stays low to the ground to give riders an insane sense of speed.

Figure 3: The massive parabolic airtime hill towards the end of the ride [5].

A roller coaster of this scale has never been built before, and this feat of engineering is a perfect representation of the speed and showmanship that is associated with the tourism industry in Saudi Arabia. While tourism’s percentage of the kingdom’s GDP has increased from 3% to 5% from 2019 to 2024, and the minister of tourism’s goal is for tourism to contribute to 10% of the GDP by 2030, some are skeptical that tourism’s historic rise in Saudi Arabia will continue. Saudi Arabia has recently pivoted its spending strategy more towards A.I., so it is up to debate whether the kingdom will continue funding its tourism expansion efforts, or if it will invest in whatever shows the most promise at any given moment [2].

References

[1] Turak, Natasha. “How Saudi Arabia Is Diversifying Away from Oil and Betting Big on AI.” CNBC, 28 Oct. 2025, https://www.cnbc.com/2025/10/28/how-saudi-arabia-is-diversifying-away-from-oil-and-betting-big-on-ai.html.

[2] “Qiddiya Investment Company Announces SAR 3.75 Billion Construction Contract to Build Six Flags Qiddiya.” Qiddiya, 2024, https://qiddiya.com/press-room/qic-announces-sar-375-billion-construction-contract-to-build-six-flags-qiddiya/.

[3] “Six Flags Qiddiya City Opens as Saudi Arabia’s Premier Entertainment Destination.” Blooloop, 2025, https://blooloop.com/six-flags-qiddiya-city-opens/.

[4] Marden, Duane. Roller Coaster DataBase, 2024, https://rcdb.com/.

[5] “Falcon's Flight Review | The World's Most Ambitious Roller Coaster | Six Flags Qiddiya City.” YouTube, uploaded by Coaster Studios, 23 Jan. 2026, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3_ixFzOGXY.

To cite this article:
Ipsen, Blake. “The New World’s Tallest Roller Coaster: Tourism Inspired Engineering in Saudi Arabia.” The BYU Design Review, 12 March 2026, https://www.designreview.byu.edu/collections/the-new-worlds-tallest-roller-coaster.