Disney’s Awesome Things #6: Experiencing Ride Breakdowns
February 15, 2010 at 7:56 pm Matt 15 comments
#6 You may wonder what I look forward to while riding the attractions in the World. Well, besides the usual experiences: smells, sights, music, theming, etc., I look forward to the ride breakdowns!
Strange, I know. But there’s just something about it. Like I mentioned in this post, it just gives me this happy feeling inside, like something that isn’t supposed to happen is happening.
Something that temporarily “ruins” the “show” does – just a little bit, just enough for me to enjoy that. It also gives you more time to enjoy the scene you are in on the ride.
My favorite rides to break down are The Haunted Mansion, Spaceship Earth, Test Track, and rides similar to these. So next time you’re stuck on attraction, just sit back, listen to the louder than normal background music, take in the details of the scene, and enjoy the quick behind the scenes part of your experience!
What rides have you been stopped on, and did you enjoy it? Share in the comments!
Photo by Todd H
Entry filed under: Disney's Awesome Things. Tags: Animal Kingdom, attraction, awesome, awesome things, breakdown, Disney, Disney World, Disney's Awesome Things, Epcot, Haunted Mansion, hollywood studios, magic kingdom, music, orlando, ride, ride breakdown, ride malfunction, Spaceship Earth, technical difficulties, Test Track, theme park, themepark, Walt Disney World, Walt Disney World Resort, WDW.
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1.
Melissa | February 16, 2010 at 5:04 pm
My nephew and I got stopped once in the middle of Haunted Mansion, right as we were entering the room with Madame Leota. We sat there for awhile, then they actually turned the lights on and had to come around to let us out of the doom buggies! As we were leaving I was trying to take pictures with my camera phone. Haunted Mansion has always been my favorite ride and that experience was one of the most amazing I have ever had on a ride at WDW.
2.
Matt | February 16, 2010 at 6:51 pm
Wow Melissa, that’s so awesome! I love the Haunted Mansion too. I, unfortunately, have never seen HM with the lights on except in a video on Youtube…
If you got any pictures of this, I would love to see them. I’ll email you so you have my email address. If not, that’s cool too.
Thanks for sharing this.
3.
Kenny | February 16, 2010 at 9:06 pm
I have been on Dinosaur, Pirates of the Caribbean and Test Track (cold room) and have had them shut down.
I have broken down on Pirates multiple times, and during Dinosaur, I broke down on a turn and when they turned the lights on, I could not see any dinosaurs, the only thing I saw was an emergency exit door.
4.
Matt | February 17, 2010 at 5:56 am
The cold room on Test Track might be a bad place to break down!
I broke down on Dinosaur once, right when you find the Iguanadon…the lights went out and the vehicle just made shaky movements, but we started moving again in a minute or two.
Thanks for sharing, Kenny!
5.
chris | February 17, 2010 at 9:38 am
Happened a few times on Buzz Lightyear, but my favorite one was about 10 minutes in the Haunted Mansion right in front of Madame Leota. It’s my favorite ride, so just being able to sit there are look at everything more closely was great. Fortunately, they didn’t have to turn on the lights. It was so fun.
I’d love to break down at the ballroom sequence, but that hasn’t happened yet.
6.
Matt | February 17, 2010 at 5:04 pm
All these people with Haunted Mansion breakdowns! My most memorable HM “stop” was for five minutes with a PERFECT view of the bride.
She was right in front of me, so I got to hear her mumble those awesome twisted wedding vows for like five minutes!
Thanks for sharing, Chris!
7.
Josh Hanagarne | February 17, 2010 at 5:07 pm
Not a Disney story, but I got caught on The Terror Ride at Lagoon here in Salt Lake City. There was also a baby with a dirty diaper in the train car, and that was far scarier than the alien diorama I spent 20 minutes staring at.
8.
Matt | February 17, 2010 at 5:42 pm
That’s fine, Josh, we like to hear non-Disney stories every now and then.
I can imagine that the dirty diaper-ed baby was very scary. And 20 minutes sure is a long time! I bet you were glad to get off after that.
Thanks, Josh. Stop by again soon, okay? =)
9.
Eric | February 22, 2010 at 10:17 am
On Haunted Mansion, I was stuck with my terrified 3-year-old on the stairs leading up to the ball room for about 5 minutes, The soundtrack was pretty loud and they didn’t turn the lights on, so it was pretty dark. We then got stuck later on that same time in the cemetary in front of one of the tombstones where the mask would pop up from behind and scream. It took a while to get my daughter to go back on that ride after that, but she loves it now.
We also got stuck on the Great Movie ride in the Indiana Jones section with the snakes. My son loved it, mainly because he loves snakes.
On Maelstrom, we got stuck at the bottom of the drop and they turned the lights on. Kind of interesting to see the slide and the scenery that way. I think I liked it better with the lights off, though. It seemed to simple otherwise.
Small World, Peter Pan’s Flight, Tomorrowland Transit Authority, and Spaceship Earth are other rides that have broken down as well.
10.
Matt | February 22, 2010 at 5:21 pm
Wow Eric, those are great breakdown stories! Sorry to hear about the Haunted problems, but at least your daughter got over her fear.
GMR would be awesome to get stopped on…it would test the creativity of the host, that’s for sure.
Thanks for sharing all these stories, Eric!
11.
Steve | March 2, 2010 at 11:18 am
We got stopped, on NYE ’02, on Splash Mountain for 45 minutes. While I would have enjoyed the time to take in the animatronics, we were stuck at the part of the ride were the fish “jumps” out of the water and gives you a little splash. I was at the back of the boat and got splashed for 45 minutes! I was completely soaked by the time we got off the ride!!!
12.
Matt | March 2, 2010 at 7:32 pm
LOL Ah, that’s too bad Steve! Well, hey, at least you had a long time to cool off, right?
13.
John | March 21, 2010 at 11:27 pm
I had some several experiences with rides breakdowns.
), I was in the fire coaster and it stopped while going up. We had a great view of the area for around 5 minutes.
1- In the tower of terror once, the elevator stopped at the very end of the ride, right before it turns for us to get out. It was stopped for around 5 minutes and we stood right beside a scary doll seated in a big chair on our left.
2- On test track I had lots of experiences… The most remarkable one was when the vehicle stopped right in front of the crash test car. When we finally turned right to have the “crash test”, the door was open, so there wasn’t that big surprise…
3- On space mountain, but this was in Disneyland, California. The trains stopped, all the lights were turned on and the staff had to push our train to the disembarking station. Really don’t know what happened.
4- On spaceship earth, the vehicle stopped while passing in front of Rome on fire. But I actually like the unique smell of that part of the attraction.
5- Another time on spaceship earth, we stopped while going down backwards. This time we stayed there for around 10 minutes listening to that voice ‘Please remain seated. Your vehicle will begin moving momentarily. Remain seated please”. It was nice, but somewhat irritating.
6- On splash mountain once, at the end of the ride, where many characters sing a song, there were no sounds at all, only moving rabbits and other animals. LOL
7- Last, but not least, once in the dueling dragons, in Islands of Adventure (you said it’s ok to hear non-Disney stories! lol
WDW central is a great blog!! I am from Sao Paulo, Brazil and, as I can’t be in Orlando whenever I want, it’s awesome to keep myself updated with news and everything from this place I love so much!
Thanks a lot for the postings!!
14.
Matt | March 22, 2010 at 5:15 am
LOL Wow John, that’s a lot of stories…very nice ones, too! I did say you could have non-Disney stories…didn’t I. =P
Out of yours here, I think Spaceship Earth would be my favorite. Test Track breaks down about every day, but still, nothing as major as the door staying open.
Those are all great, thanks so much for sharing – also, muchas gracias for the compliments on the blog…glad you enjoy it, man. And now we have some international readers…awesome!
15.
Courtney | March 14, 2011 at 12:12 am
About 7 or 8 years ago, I got stuck on the Pirate’s ride. It was pretty cool, but it was very chilly. I got stuck at the part where the wind was blowing and there was a skeleton. I remember the deep voice on the overhead repeating the same warnings over and over.