Big Thunder Mountain Railroad
| Big Thunder Mountain Railroad | |
|---|---|
| Park | Magic Kingdom |
| Land / area | Frontierland |
| Type | Steel mine train roller coaster |
| Opened | November 15, 1980 |
| Designer | Tony Baxter / Walt Disney Imagineering |
| Height req. | 40 in (102 cm) |
| Status | Operating |
Big Thunder Mountain Railroad is a steel mine train roller coaster in Frontierland at Magic Kingdom in Walt Disney World, Florida. Presented as a runaway mine train racing through a flooded, quake-prone mining town in the American Southwest, it opened on November 15, 1980, a little over a year after the first version of the ride at Disneyland Park in California. It is one of the park's most popular thrill rides and, together with Space Mountain and the park's other peaks, forms part of the informal group of Magic Kingdom "mountains".
History
The ride's origins lie in a much larger unbuilt project. In the early 1970s, Imagineer Marc Davis designed the Western River Expedition, an elaborate boat ride through the American West that was to anchor a huge mesa complex called Thunder Mesa in Frontierland. When demand for a major thrill ride grew and the Expedition stalled, Imagineer Tony Baxter salvaged one element of the concept — a runaway mine train — and developed it as a standalone roller coaster, using computer-aided design at a time when that was still unusual for ride layout work.
The Disneyland version opened first, in September 1979, on the site of the former Mine Train Through Nature's Wonderland. Construction of the Florida version followed, and the Magic Kingdom ride opened on November 15, 1980. Its mountain, built from steel and sculpted concrete, was modeled on the hoodoos of Bryce Canyon in Utah, while the Disneyland mountain drew on Monument Valley. The Florida layout runs to roughly 2,780 feet (847 m) of track with a ride time of about three and a half minutes.
The attraction has closed several times for refurbishment. A lengthy closure in 2012 added an interactive queue themed as the offices of the fictional Big Thunder Mining Company, and in January 2025 the ride closed again for an extended refurbishment in which much of the track was replaced.
Experience
The backstory places riders in the gold-rush town of Tumbleweed, where the Big Thunder Mining Company has dug into a mountain the local Native American tradition holds to be cursed. The queue winds through the mining company's headquarters and past hoists, assay equipment and warning notices before reaching the station, where guests board five-car trains styled as mine locomotives named I.M. Brave, I.M. Fearless, U.R. Courageous, U.R. Daring and U.B. Bold.
The train climbs through a bat-filled cavern, passes under a waterfall and races around the mountain's outside in a series of banked turns and short drops, reaching about 36 mph (58 km/h). The course dips through the flooded remains of Tumbleweed, where townsfolk figures ride out the waters in boats and on rooftops, passes the skeletons of a dinosaur embedded in the rockwork, and threads a canyon of spurting geysers before returning to the station. Effects along the route include a simulated earthquake in the lift cavern, added to the Florida version in later years.
Other versions
Versions of the attraction also operate at Disneyland Park, Tokyo Disneyland and Disneyland Paris, where it occupies an island in the Rivers of America and is the largest of the four. A differently themed relative, Big Grizzly Mountain Runaway Mine Cars, operates at Hong Kong Disneyland.