Here’s a really fast carousel made of ice, which looks a lot scarier than it sounds

You may have great memories of gliding down frozen sidewalks when you were small, or perhaps waving to your mom each time you rode by on a fiberglass carousel horse, but chances are the two have never combined — until now. Yes, there is officially an ice carousel, and also yes, it looks as scary as it sounds.

The couple behind the Hydraulic Press Channel (a highly addictive and oddly satisfying channel where we can watch objects get slowly broken down by a mean and unstoppable hydraulic press) have cleared out a round of totally frozen lake and gotten to work.

They fixed 5 poles halfway deep into the ice, solidifying them in place as the temp dropped to -20º C. They wanted four 50-horsepower engines to spin them “but no one would give them to us, for some weird reason,” laughs Finnish factory owner Lauri Vuohensilta, alongside his wife Anni. Famous last words? Maybe. Let’s not knock it until we try it!

Round and round and round she goes, where she stops? Let’s just hope not the emergency room.

We love that this video is called the “world’s fastest ice carousel.” Is there competition? Like, how many of these things exists on Earth? The couple plots out their “round,” clears off the snow, and then cuts the large circle of ice out with an effin’ chainsaw. For the first time, you can sorta see where this is going and it’s got us nervous, excited, and a little cringe-y.

At one point, a drone flies over and we see that the cut between the round and the rest of the frozen lake is, like, a foot wide. We know they survive because this, well, this video exists, but dude. We’re afraid to walk down a stone stairway is there’s even a patch on ice on it.

Just as the couple happily spins at about 3 mph, Lauri says the most insane words we’ve ever heard: Now we are going to go get the car.

They tie the posts in the middle, wound around a few times, to the trailer of an ATV. Then this happens:

After a brief convo between husband and wife that basically goes: “Okay, you go on it.” “No, you go on it,” the couple finds some “stunt guys” to ride the Super Icy Wheel of Frozen Death.

They two guys each take a turn, anchoring themselves within the center posts and praying not to be flung into the outside ring of icy water. This guy bought flares:

“It could use some work, but it was good to have somebody test it,” says Lauri, at the end of the ride.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZK3RBJ4P8I?feature=oembed

We think we’ll stick to the colorful horse kind of merry-go-round for now, but isn’t it great to know that there are minds like these out there, willing to ride a giant spinning ice disk just for the hell of it? We think so.