In aviation, a "corkscrew" is often used to describe a helical path around a fixed point—for example, flying a helix around the smoke trail of another aircraft. It is often considered a "benign" maneuver in terms of G-force compared to more aggressive combat moves. Interestingly, many people (including Peppy from Star Fox ) use "barrel roll" when they actually mean an aileron roll , which is a simple rotation around the plane's longitudinal axis without any pitch change. 2. Roller Coasters: The Geometry of Thrills