One of the best summer treats is the waterslide: a slide with water running down it. The first park waterslide ever, built in 1923, was made of wood. People would ride down the ramp on sleds, and shoot across the water at the bottom for up to 100 feet. Since then, we’ve gone bigger and better. The longest “homemade” waterslide in the world was built on a cattle ranch in New Zealand. A bunch of guys used machines and shovels to dig a long, muddy trench into a giant hill, then lined it with plastic. After 2 months of work, in just 2 days some 2,000 brave souls tried it out. But the longest waterslide in the world as of last summer lives at Action Park in New Jersey. The nearly 2,000-foot-long slide blows up like a bouncy house, which takes 2 hours. It then uses 1,000 gallons of water every hour. Last we heard it wasn’t open yet for visitors, but we hope we can ride it soon!
Wee ones: If you’ve taken 5 rides down the slide, what number is your next ride?
Little kids: If a water park has 3 body waterslides, 2 inner tube slides, and 1 rafting slide, how many waterslides does it have in total? Bonus: If you wait 20 minutes to ride the slide but slide down in just 3 minutes, how much time did you take in total?
Big kids: The longest waterslide in use is the 7-story tall Mammoth water coaster in Indiana. If they can safely run 7 4-passenger rafts on the slide at any time, how many people can ride at once? Bonus: The slide is almost 1,800 feet long. If the 7 rafts are evenly spaced, including one at the start and 1 at the very end, how far apart are they?
Answers:
Wee ones: Ride #6.
Little kids: 6 slides. Bonus: 23 minutes.
Big kids: 28 people. Bonus: 300 feet, since the 7 rafts have just 6 chunks of space between them.
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