Great America To Host Cockroach Eating Contest For Fright Fest

Six Flags Great America theme park guests will be challenged to consume Madagascar hissing cockroaches, for Six Flags Great America park advantage. The contest began last Saturday October 7 and will be held from 7 to 8 p.m. Fridays and 5 to 6 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays through October.

All park guests who have successfully completed of the deed will earn a free T-shirt and a strip of four Flash Pass tickets allowing three friends to jump to the front of the line at all rides through October 29, Six Flags spokesman Jim Taylor said. Who wants to sit in front of the successfully completed winners on the Superman-Ultimate Flight? That is the ride that speeds you through the sky at a high speeds.

As soon as the contest was announced People for Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) started calling all of the Six Flags Great America in order to present pressure in canceling the live cockroach-eating contest. However at the time of me writing this Wednesday, October 11, 2006 the contest is still being advertised on Six Flags Great America web site. Six Flags Great America is staging the contest as part of a promotion leading up to Halloween.

"Insects do not deserve to be eaten alive especially for a gratuitous marketing gimmick," said PETA spokeswoman Jackie Vergerio

On Oct. 13th, Great America plans to host an open-invitation attempt to break the Guinness world record for most Madagascar cockroaches (baked in this case, not live) eaten in a single minute. Madagascar hissing cockroaches are large, wingless cockroaches that can grow to between 1.5 to 3 inches. The record of 36 roaches has stood for the last five years. The current world record is held by Ken Edwards of Derbyshire, England, who devoured 36 Madagascar hissing cockroaches in one minute in 2001.

Six Flags Great America spokesman James Taylor said the only complaints they have received were from people who did not have the opportunity to sign up and eat a cockroach because only 12 of its 30 parks in the United States, Canada, and Mexico were participating in the promotion.

Taylor dismissed any health concerns, saying the cockroaches were raised in a sterile environment and were as safe to eat as shrimp or lobster with high nutritional value.

"Its something that is supposed to be scary, its icky, its gross, its Halloween fun and its just one small part of the haunted houses and thrilling rides going on."




"LEARNING, n. The kind of ignorance distinguishing the studious."

Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914), "The Devils Dictionary", 1911