StormRider
| StormRider | |
|---|---|
| Park | Tokyo DisneySea |
| Land / area | Port Discovery |
| Type | Motion simulator |
| Opened | September 4, 2001 |
| Closed | May 16, 2016 |
| Designer | Walt Disney Imagineering
|
| Status | Closed |
StormRider was a large-scale motion simulator attraction in Port Discovery at Tokyo DisneySea, the second park of the Tokyo Disney Resort in Urayasu, Chiba, Japan. Guests boarded a futuristic flying laboratory — the StormRider — on a mission to fly into the heart of an enormous storm and destroy it from within. It opened with the park on September 4, 2001, and operated for nearly fifteen years before closing on May 16, 2016; its building and ride system were taken over by Nemo & Friends SeaRider, which opened on May 12, 2017.[1][2]
History
StormRider was the anchor attraction of Port Discovery, the park's retro-futuristic marina, when Tokyo DisneySea opened on September 4, 2001. Its show building, copper-roofed and crowded with mechanical devices, was themed as the Center for Weather Control, a scientific laboratory that fitted the port's story of researchers studying the seas and skies. The attraction was presented by JCB, admitted guests 90 cm and taller, and for much of its life offered FastPass.[1]
On May 19, 2015, the Oriental Land Company announced that StormRider would close to make way for a new simulator based on Pixar's Finding Nemo and Finding Dory.[3] The final day of operation was May 16, 2016, marked by a farewell campaign among fans under the slogan "StormRider Forever". The replacement, Nemo & Friends SeaRider, kept the simulator hardware and theatre but replaced the storm story with an undersea voyage aboard a submarine that shrinks to fish size; it opened on May 12, 2017.[4]
Experience
The mission was set up in a pre-show room dominated by a huge radar screen and a model of the "Fuse", a storm-dissipating device. A researcher briefed guests: a storm of historic size was bearing down on Port Discovery, and their StormRider would carry the Fuse into its eye and detonate it. After a short demonstration of the device, guests entered the hangar and boarded one of two flying laboratories, each seating 122 guests; the full experience ran about 14 minutes.[1]
When the windshield cover opened, the vehicle appeared to be hovering outside the hangar, with the second StormRider waiting ahead and views across Port Discovery's waters to the ocean beyond. On takeoff, the floating city of Hydra 7 dropped away beneath the cabin. Approaching the storm, the flight turned dangerous: a lightning strike disabled the other StormRider and forced it back to base, and although the guests' pilot, Captain Davis, was ordered to return as well, he pressed on toward the eye. Inside the storm the Fuse malfunctioned and punctured the hull before finally detonating and breaking the storm apart — leaving a damaged aircraft and a race back to Port Discovery, ending in a splashdown landing on the water outside the Center for Weather Control.[1]
StormRider was remembered for the scale of its simulator cabins and the completeness of its illusion: unlike smaller motion bases, the whole theatre seemed to fly, and the windshield view sold the takeoff, the storm penetration and the final water landing as one continuous flight.
See also
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 StormRider. Wikipedia. Retrieved 2026-11-15.
- ↑ Nemo & Friends SeaRider. Wikipedia. Retrieved 2026-11-15.
- ↑ 'Finding Dory' Ride Coming To Tokyo Disney Resort In 2017. /Film. Retrieved 2026-11-15.
- ↑ Nemo & Friends SeaRider. Wikipedia. Retrieved 2026-11-15.