Reactions are pouring in on-line to information of a brand new water park set to open at Lake Lanier this summer season that can function Georgia’s first waterslide coaster.
Officers and crews broke floor on the Apocalypso coaster on Wednesday. The attraction is a four-slide tower and the centerpiece attraction at Fins Up Water Park, which is opening Could 4 at Margaritaville at Lanier Islands.
“This monumental funding marks probably the most vital growth of Margaritaville at Lanier Islands in a long time, including Georgia’s largest waterslide complicated to the water park, boasting a formidable 15 slides in complete in 2024,” park officers wrote.
Many on-line weren’t offered on the thought of a water park at Lake Lanier, given its historical past. It has been the positioning of quite a few drownings and lethal water accidents over time, so it’s gained a popularity amongst locals for being “haunted.”
The Georgia Division of Pure Assets reported that greater than 210 folks died at Lake Lanier between 1994 and 2010 in drownings and boating accidents.
Of the roughly 40 drownings that occurred in Georgia waters in 2023, eight of them have been at Lake Lanier, making that 12 months one of many deadliest years on document for the lake. One of many victims was even electrocuted earlier than he died.
There have been six drownings in 2022, 4 in 2021, seven in 2020, and eight in 2019 and 2018, in line with Channel 2 Information.
Tameka Foster, the ex-wife of singer and songwriter Usher, has beforehand referred to as for officers to undertake “drain, clear, restore and enhance security measures” at Lake Lanier. Foster’s son, Kile Glover, who was Usher’s stepson, died in a jet ski-related incident on the lake in 2012.
Lake Lanier is a man-made lake shaped in 1956 when the Chattahoochee River was dammed for flood management and energy era. It additionally offers ingesting water for almost 5 million folks in North Georgia.
The lake sits atop what was as soon as the positioning of a thriving Black group referred to as Oscarville. Oscarville was established within the 1800s throughout the Reconstruction period and, although small, it was dwelling to a profitable Black populace stuffed with carpenters, blacksmiths, bricklayers, and farmers.
The city was destroyed in 1912 after an 18-year-old white lady was discovered lifeless in woods near the group. Three Black males have been accused of her rape and homicide and have been subsequently lynched. By the 12 months’s finish, the entire group’s residents have been violently pushed out.
City legends have surfaced in current a long time resulting from what some observers are calling a weird sample of deaths at Lake Lanier, so most social customers had darker responses to the information that the lake will now be dwelling to a water park.
Margaritaville at Lanier Islands is a waterfront park in Buford, Georgia, lower than 50 miles exterior Atlanta. It’s located on the small islands of Lake Lanier. Guests can camp, fish, boat, swim, and seashore on lakeside shores.
