Magnetic Hill... Where cars defy gravity

A few hours out of Adelaide, near the town of Orroroo, there’s a hill where cars roll up, not down. Or at least, that’s what the sign says. Every year, countless tourists turn up to try out the phenomenon. They switch their cars into neutral and freak the kids out as they gently roll up the hill. But it’s all an illusion created by the locals to fool the tourists. So how does this illusion work and should you tell the kids the truth - or just enjoy the surprised silence as you roll up the hill?

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
A few hours out of Adelaide, near the outback town
of Auroru. There's a hill. Nothing weird about that until
you watch the way the cars roll. Not down the
slope like you'd expect here, the cars roll uphill. I'm
Amanda Keller and this is brain fuel Rolling Uphill to

(00:23):
bring you great osy stories from the road, fueled by Ampole,
Australia's own. To reach this mysterious destination, you must travel
through paddocks of sheep and cows until you reach an
ominous sign on the side of the road. Will your
vehicle roll uphill or down?

Speaker 2 (00:44):
The urban legend is that it was discovered when someone
parked their car or they put a rock under the
front and they got out and that kind of rolled
in the other direction.

Speaker 1 (00:52):
That's Julian O'Shea, a YouTuber who takes viewers to some
of our most extreme places. Magnetic Hill is one of them.
This famous South Australian location has been wowing tourists for
decades and he wanted to find out if it was
really a giant magnet. The results, well, they may surprise you.

Speaker 2 (01:13):
You follow the instructions, you park on the hill, you
let your foot go and the car just starts to gently,
very slowly roll up the hill.

Speaker 1 (01:21):
Well, that sounds right, so far a completely localized gravity
defying mound.

Speaker 2 (01:26):
You can park your car in front of a big sign,
big magnet sitting on the top of the hill, and
it gives you some instructions to turn off the mission,
to take your foot gently off the break, and your
car will roll up the hill. Now on the signe
there's a few things that give you a bit of
a warning, staying that this type of metal roll down
the hill, and this type of metal car roll up
the hill, and that's what it feels like.

Speaker 1 (01:48):
Hang on feels like. So it's a trick.

Speaker 2 (01:53):
There's nothing magnetic about the geology that's there. In fact,
the whole thing is an optical illusion.

Speaker 1 (01:58):
The way it works is this, the slope actually runs downhill,
but because of the layout of the surrounding land, there's
no way for the driver to get any perspective. Objects
we would normally assume to be upright, like trees, might
look like they're on a lean. Apparently, the most important
factor is not being able to see the horizon. Without it,

(02:21):
our puny human brains can no longer judge the slope
we're literally standing or driving on. Then when our car
rolls down the hill, it really does look like we're
going up.

Speaker 2 (02:33):
What it's doing is it's going on a very gentle downhill,
while all of the surrounding areas give you the illusion
of the other direction.

Speaker 1 (02:41):
Actually, similar hills exist all around the world. They call
them gravity hills or even cyclops hills, and they're famous
for this incredibly realistic illusion, or just maybe they're actually
a little bit magic from rolling uphill or whatever your journey.

(03:03):
Ampole is the fuel that gets us there. Make sure
you follow our adventures for free in your favorite podcast app.
I'm Amanda Keller and this is brain Fuel.