DisneySky - COMPLETE & RESTORED

[D Hulk]

COSMIC CRATER

Experience a goofy Atom Age future that never was in the dry American desert

TIME: April 12th, 1961

Cosmic Crater is an Atom Age oasis in the harsh badlands of New Mexico. It is an atompunk wonderland, and a testament to the history of space exploration. In under a century, flight has lifted Man off of the ground and now sent Man out into the stars! Cosmic Crater explores that stellar history in a rather tongue-in-cheek manner. The land’s tone borrows heavily from goofy mid-century B-movies. This is a fantastical world of flying saucers and little green men. Some genuine - yet dated - futurism is present as well, channeling the spirit of the original 1955 Tomorrowland through a retro-futuristic lens which will never grow dated.

Cosmic Crater first began suddenly on December 21st, 1960, when a meteor crash landed in the New Mexican desert! Luna Diesel, daughter of William, quickly arrived with a phalanx of S.K.Y. scientists (or “S.K.Y.entists”) to research this impact. A community of astronauts and astronomers quickly grew up around the crater. What they discovered was out of this world! The green-glowing meteorite was composed of a chemical more powerful than uranium. The surrounding deserts were a hotbed of unexplained phenomena and extraterrestrial activity. Most shocking of all, a far larger asteroid loomed in the cosmos above, an asteroid with the potential to destroy all of civilization...and it was headed directly towards Earth!

Cosmic Crater is DisneySky’s smallest land, nestled in between Langley Lagoon and the sun-baked western slopes of Mt. Helios. This is the American Southwest at its most alien, inspired by places like Roswell and Los Alamos and Area 51. Here guests can take part in an expedition into outer space to destroy the deadly asteroid. They can also venture into an airplane graveyard for a spooky, silly close encounter. Or they can simply soak up the atmosphere in an Atom Age lounge or a stylish bomb shelter.
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Land Layout & Details

Attractions: 79. IMPACT! (The Asteroid from Outer Space), 80. Atomic Boneyard, 81. Flying Saucers 2.0
Dining: 82. Quarks, 83. Bunker Bistro, 84. Guzzlin' Gremlins
Retail: 85. Area 55, 86. Meteorite Mart, 87. Lunar Gifts

The striated archway of Diesel Bay is a perfectly-framed introduction to Cosmic Crater. The entire arid western slope of Mt. Helios looms ahead, covered in a thicket of strangely-shaped red sandstone formations. The conical crater sits at the mountain’s base, surrounded by sci-fi facilities. The nearby foothills are covered in fantastical cactus forests - all Joshua trees and agaves and barrel cacti, verdant and overgrown like an arboretum desert garden. Forced-perspective satellite dishes (modeled after New Mexico’s VLA) stand flanked like soldiers along the mountainous ridgelines, silently monitoring the skies.

The land music for Cosmic Crater leans heavily into the 1950s B-movie style. There is a strong emphasis on the Theremin, on haunted guitar, and on extremely early electronic music like Pierre Henry’s Psyche Rock. This sci-fi soundtrack sampling provides a decent idea of the land’s musical ambiance.



A two-lane black tar highway leads past a forgotten town towards the crater. To the left, Quarks blocks views of urban Avengers Airspace across the Lagoon. Quarks is a trippy, retro table service restaurant which resurrects Imagineering’s now-defunct Encounter restaurant. To the right, nearby boulders feature Native American petroglyphs. Depicted in these carvings we see a traditional rain dance - a weather reference, to continue the sky theme - plus drawings of early UFO visitations which imply a long history of the bizarre in this area.

Past bullethole-ridden radioactivity signs half-buried under small sand dunes, past Area 51-style “Warning” signage, eerie canyons lead into an airplane graveyard. This is the site of Atomic Boneyard, an original trackless dark ride which is more or less an alien version of Haunted Mansion. Next door is Area 55, a chintzy tourist trap shop built from an abandoned gas station trying to capitalize on alien mania. New Mexican ristras (hanging garlands of dried red chile peppers) line the nearby fences.

Past a spherical rocket fuel storage container, the pathway splits into two. To the right, Vasquez Rock formations give way to a closeup view of the crater. Rocketships splash down in a bay at the crater’s base, beckoning guests to enter the monumental cavity through a large corrugated metal storm drain tunnel.

The paved highway wends left around the crater’s perimeter, where ponytail palms and cercidium floridum trees provide welcome shade and block views of Avengers Airspace. More visual obstructions come courtesy of a vintage U.S. military jeep, and rock formations inspired by Nevada’s Valley of Fire. The cracked, dried lakeshore resembles a salt flat. A steel Googie bridge crosses the splashdown bay, to a sandy isthmus. Here is the Guzzlin’ Gremlins drink stand, set within a decommissioned fuselage, and the Lunar Gifts merchandise wagon. The pavement gives way to a cracked dry riverbed walkway. Another Googie bridge to the left, this one with overly-thick steel cross beams inspired by When Worlds Collide, spans Langley Lagoon and leads guests to Avengers Airspace - specifically to the starboard wing of the land’s massive Helicarrier. Since every land transition is marked by an arched gateway of some sort, guests pass under a Googie octopod inspired by LAX’s Theme Building. Continuing along the seco riverbed leads to another crater entrance, this one through a series of hollow cargo containers.

Every crater entrance leads to a circular plaza. Dry, sandy crater walls surround it in all directions. Pockmarked mini-craters dot the desert floors. At the depression’s center is the green-glowing meteorite which created the caldera. This steaming space rock sits on display atop a raised platform akin to the Tomorrowland 1955 World Clock, and this platform in turn sits atop the sunken Meteorite Mart post-ride shop. Manmade stones surround the circular shop on all sides, depicting the phases of the moon. A rocketry facility along the crater’s outer berm leads to the E-ticket roller coaster IMPACT! (The Asteroid from Outer Space), where guests rocket into outer space and confront a doomsday asteroid. Hemispherical domes on the other side house Flying Saucers 2.0, which fuses a teacups flat ride with an interactive shooter ride.

One final buried tunnel leads north through the crater walls. This passageway features an inverse arc rooftop shaped like Calatrava’s Dulles terminal building, holding back the lunar rocks. Mid-century S.K.Y. posters line the tunnel interior, depicting fanciful dreams of spaceflight. Beyond the crater is one more Googie bridge and a sandy courtyard bearing the S.K.Y. seal - which resembles a rejected period NASA logo. From these vantage points, guests enjoy spectacular views of IMPACT’s initial launch: flames shoot out from beneath the coaster tracks as rocketship trains propel up the slopes of Mt. Helios and out-of-sight in a jaw-dropping simulated space launch.

Views of Avengers Airspace across the waterways are again obscured, this time by eerie tufa pillars. These bizarre volcanic limestone formations pepper Langley Lagoon like the shores of Mono Lake, mixed in with other equally-alien visuals like saguaro cacti or weather balloons. Lake Havasu-style rocks also block views; as seen from the Avengers Airspace side, desert rock views are blocked by Battery Park elements like hedgerows and concrete water walls.

Opposite this and carved into Mt. Helios’ sandstone cliffs stands Bunker Bistro. This major counter service restaurant offers additional views of IMPACT’s launch from within an enclosed bomb shelter. Above this edifice is a big air raid siren perched high atop a metal tower. On display in the nearby slopes is a Coleoptere, quite possibly the strangest-looking aircraft ever devised!

Final passageway to Runway One’s Mercury Circle is through an open air tunnel stylized like a Googie car wash roof. A portion of this rooftop is buried underneath a fresh rockslide from Mt. Helios. The slide even spills out into the S.K.Y. courtyard, with “temporary” barriers hastily erected around the boulders.
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Cast member outfits
Cast members portray members of S.K.Y.’s scientific research team, clad in NASA-style jumpsuits complete with the S.K.Y. seal. Other cast members (particularly those working Atomic Boneyard) dress as ‘50s-era U.S. soldiers.
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Streetmosphere
Out on the highway near Area 55, a live musician plays the Theremin. This amazing musical instrument is played without touch, creating that iconic sci-fi “whoo-oo-oo” noise.
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Walkaround characters
There are no official IP tie-ins found in Cosmic Crater. Instead, a “Living Character Initiative” Mars rover robot roams about freely, interacting with guests.
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Restrooms
Restrooms are carved into the Vasquez Rocks formations near Area 55. These facilities are a replica of Crane’s “Bathroom of Tomorrow” once found in Disneyland’s 1955 opening day Tomorrowland.
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Churro carts
Cast members serve churros from Googie-esque rocket fuel carts, which are heavily styled to resemble ‘50s icon Robbie the Robot. Churros come filled with raspberry and coated in Pop Rocks.
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Drinking fountains
Fountains shaped like UFOs sit on the ends of Googie poles.
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Trash cans
Trash cans are plain, egg-shaped Space Age bins.
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Benches
Benches are equally simple and streamlined: cantilevered stainless steel designs that are equal parts Googie and Charles & Ray Eames.
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Umbrellas
Monochrome, colorful tarps in an Atom Age style.
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Fencing
Sleek simplicity is the game with fencing as well, which unobtrusively continues our Googie design trend.
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Lighting
Similar to the various Tomorrowlands, Cosmic Crater’s nighttime lighting package really brings the land to life with a shifting, otherworldly, psychedelic color scheme. There are many possible light sources, such as street poles which resemble lava lamps, or whirling lights shaped like the atomic symbol, or simple recessed neon lighting.
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Misters
Steam escapes from small craters all along the perimeter of the main caldera.
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Stroller corrals & phone-charging stations
The abandoned Atomoco gas station which houses Atomic Boneyard’s FastPass machine also houses charging stations. These stations are formed from era-appropriate coffee vending machines, which promise “Energy Recharges!”​

 

[D Hulk]

Cosmic Crater - Attractions​

 

[D Hulk]

IMPACT!
The Asteroid from Outer Space
E-ticket roller coaster

Launch into space and rescue the Earth from a collision course asteroid

[HEIGHT REQUIREMENT]

The meteor which created Cosmic Crater, where we now stand, was merely a precursor. A far larger asteroid approaches from outer space, an asteroid the size of a mountain. The media have dubbed it the Asteroid Damocles, and it threatens to obliterate all life on Earth! Now, guests are called upon to board an experimental S.K.Y. rocketship, blast off into the cosmos, and destroy the Asteroid Damocles before it’s too late! IMPACT! is a thrilling E-ticket roller coaster that is full of surprises!

The impact of IMPACT! is evident all throughout Cosmic Canyon. Rocket trains blastoff north of the crater, and splashdown south of it. These rockets are the invention of S.K.Y.’s Dr. Luna Diesel, world-renowned astrophysicist and daughter of industrialist William Diesel. Dr. Diesel has assembled a fleet of experimental rocketships to achieve the unthinkable...manned flight into space.

While rocket trains perpetually circle the crater’s perimeter, the entrance to IMPACT! is located within the crater...within S.K.Y.’s ultra-modern scientific research complex built into the crater wall. Tomorrowland’s vintage, red 1959 Moonliner is repurposed here as a decidedly atompunk weenie. The crater’s central mounted meteorite opposite the Moonliner, steaming and glowing green, serves as a reminder of the stakes.

FastPass distribution takes place to the left, under a Space Age cantilevered roof looking like a Googie car wash. Miniature retro rocket machines manage the FastPass reservations. The overflow queue is also found under this rooftop, circling underneath the Moonliner’s tailfin base. Shaded queue space is carved from the sandy crater walls, which are held in place by metal netting. A starburst chandelier serves as a focal point.

The queue proper begins inside a sleekly white Googie dome, looking for all the world like a goofier, Atom Age version of Buckminster Fuller’s Spaceship Earth. With its semi-spherical Cinerama Dome shape, and with its jagged red points emanating out in all directions, this structure suggests an asteroid collision. Entry to the dome is through a small minimalist portico structure at its base, itself shaped like a lunar lander.

Queue - Asteroid Museum

Indoors, the portico opens up to an airy rotunda space under the dome, featuring a lobby similar to (but slightly smaller than) Tokyo Disneyland’s Ride & Go Seek queue. Picture a spotless, clinical hospital facility, all polished tiles and shades of white. Mounted near the entrance is a stylized plastic globe of earth made of sleek grey aluminum. A mosaic mural on the ceiling depicts the asteroid collision which killed the dinosaurs, realized with startling Technicolor rainbow hues (and quite a few nods to Animal Kingdom’s Dinosaur).

The queue spirals around the circular lobby, starting with the perimeter. Outer concrete walls bear S.K.Y. posters done in a vintage NASA style. Recesses in between the concrete slabs feature asteroid museum displays, like shelving cases of assorted meteorites the size of basketballs. Framed 1960s-era newspapers spell out the backstory for Cosmic Crater and Dr. Diesel: the initial meteorite impact, the formation of a S.K.Y. research facility, the planned space mission...

Then the queue doubles back to circle a circular pit in the dome’s center. Transparent plexiglass panes cover the pit, which contains a glowing nuclear reactor pool with steaming carbon rods raising and lowering like clockwork. Luckily for guests, after this the queue exits the rotunda, heads around an airlock door bearing the atomic symbol and enters a decontamination chamber. In this “ANTI-RADIATION ZONE” (so declared by a backlit warning sign), steam blasts and blinking red vertical lights help cleanse guests of their radioactivity.

Astronaut Training Facilities

Guests are now well and truly within the S.K.Y. facility, which throughout feels like 1960s NASA mixed with 1950s sci-fi. Next up is an astronaut training chamber, housed in a lengthwise corridor formed by curving steel ribs shaped like upside down Vs.

There are several interactive elements here to keep guests occupied:
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• A variation on NASA’s lung capacity test, where spaceman applicants held a ping pong ball in a vertical tube with only their breath. Here guests do the same with handheld grips, somewhat like a love tester machine.​
• A kinetic aerotrim gyroscope, containing a crash test dummy. The device features three axes of movement which guests control with three separate joysticks.​
• A “Simon” memorization game on a control panel.​

Cloth spacesuits hang within a row of transparent cylinders. A convex bubble window peers in on a (forced perspective) spinning centrifuge room. TV screens play grainy period footage of genuine Mercury Program astronaut experiments. Laboratory desks overflow with biometric readout equipment.

Supercomputer Chamber

A tunnel of cinder blocks and crater soil leads around a U-turn. The tight quarters open up again, now into a large rectangular room containing a single 1961 supercomputer. Massive blocky cabinets line the walls. Mainframes house a tangle of spinning reel-to-reel discs, tiny blinking lights, cathode tubes, and switchboard wires.

A wall array of period television sets completely covers one wall. Each television plays the same pre-show program, a crackly news broadcast outlining the ride’s asteroid storyline. Guests pulse through the ever-flowing queue as this program plays on a continuous loop. Presented with limited 1960s graphic animation, newscasters stoically discuss the imminent Asteroid Damocles. They outline S.K.Y.’s Dr. Diesel and her plans to explode the asteroid using a manned rocket. Mixed in with narration and interviews from Dr. Diesel, footage is spliced in of the rocket being built, its launch track under construction, lab-coated S.K.Y. scientists calculating on slide rules. There is cheery talk about “those bold, brave minds at S.K.Y. working tirelessly to save Mankind!”

S.K.Y. Mission Control

The queue continues in a straight line through an observation chamber, dimly lit and painted in black. Slanted windows overlook the S.K.Y. mission control room, which is vacant now but was just recently a flurry of activity. Three rows of computer banks together face a “big board” map of Earth. Stylistically, this set is part NASA, part Destination Moon. Half-eaten boxes of Chinese takeout still line the monitor stations. Very tall chalkboards on the inner wall feature incredibly complex astrophysics equations; ladders nearby let technicians reach the higher boards.

The room concludes past a vacated reception desk. Small details in this corner tell a big story. Next to a still-steaming mug of coffee, a newspaper declares “Asteroid Dooms Earth!” Nearby, there is a chalkboard outlining Dr. Diesel’s rocket mission. An elevation sketch details the launch tracks. A space map shows the rocket’s planned trajectory, using a “moon shot” to boomerang around the Moon and reach the Asteroid Damocles. Blueprints mounted to cork boards describe the missiles which will explode the asteroid.

A basic Space Age tunnel with klieg lights continues the queue’s straightforward route. A glass block partition obscures views onto the ride’s loading platform, which soon comes into view...

Loading - Vehicle Assembly Building

The Vehicle Assembly Building (or VAB) is an industrial Space Age palace of science. This is an atompunk variation on NASA’s absolutely massive construction center, full of frosted clearstory window bays and mazes of gantries overhead. Curving metallic ribs painted in international orange give this boxy warehouse a hint of a cylindrical rocket shape.

The VAB - actually a pair of them, joined at odd angles by a red-roofed shed - is visible from outside as well, even from across Langley Lagoon in Avengers Airspace. The exterior bears the circular mid-century S.K.Y. emblem. Blue window grids divide up the VAB. Organic flowing tufa formations on the lakeside level contrast against the plain, blocky structure.

Polished silver rocket trains arrive empty into the station, emerging from a darkened tunnel corner. A red-nosed, bullet-shaped lead “locomotive” is modeled after the Opel RAK 2 rocket car. Trains park amidst haphazard piles of rocketry supplies, items like loading equipment, fuel canisters, and space helmets. Evidently, in their haste to prepare for the incoming Asteroid Damocles, S.K.Y.’s scientists ignored their usual fastidiousness.

Googie gates open up and guests board the six train cars, each seating three rows of two. IMPACT! uses the same Vekoma roller coaster ride system and loading arrangement as Expedition Everest. (Ride intensity sits neatly between Disneyland’s Big Thunder Mountain and California Adventure’s Incredicoaster.) Onboard speakers provide a thrilling original soundtrack plus instructions relayed by Dr. Diesel. She starts with a simple order to stow belongings and pull down lap bars.
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RIDE STATS
Ride type: Vekoma launched roller coaster
Capacity per train: 34
Hourly capacity: 2,050
Duration: 2:50
Height restriction: 44”​

Once seated, guests will notice a massive digital countdown timer mounted ahead over the VAB’s exit tunnel. It declares “Time to Impact!” The hours, minutes and seconds tick away anticipating Asteroid Damocles’ collision…The timer is actually counting down to one hour past DisneySky’s closing time.​

 

[MickeyWaffleCo.]

Tomorrow can’t come soon enough!

 

[Suchomimus]

Tomorrow can’t come soon enough!

That’s how I feel everyday since September 18th.

 

[D Hulk]

Ride Experience - Roll Out!

Red lights turn green. Brakes unlock and rocket trains roll out of the VAB station. Exiting through a corrugated tunnel to the outdoors, rockets round a corner skirting the crater’s base, drifting through an eerie & alien forest of tufas.

Rockets pass a S.K.Y. weather balloon. They pass through rows of spinning radar dishes, and enter a Lake Havasu-style red rock canyon. A train tunnel passes under the northern Cosmic Crater entry bridge (hiding the ride’s maintenance shed). From the riders' perspective, this cave resembles the entrance to NORAD.

Blast Off!

Rockets emerge onto a launch track straightaway and come to a halt. Thick, oversized rocket sled tracks sit atop ribbed titanium supports, pointing forward...forward, straight up the slopes of Mt. Helios! The tracks vanish through a metal tube which sits perched sideways on the sandstone cliffs. Smaller forced perspective tracks exit from the rocket tube before ending in a spike.

This is a space launch track!

Sci-fi fans will recognize the sloped rail setup from 1951’s When Worlds Collide. Guests exploring throughout Cosmic Crater - walking the pathways or dining in the Bunker Bistro bay window overlook - can watch IMPACT!’s spectacular space launches at regular intervals. Much like Space Mountain in Paris, the mountaintop tube simulates a cannon launch, firing off a mushroom cloud every time a rocket passes through and presumably fires into the atmosphere.

Ride layout

On-ride music starts to swell as the countdown commences. IMPACT!’s original score is composed by Hans Zimmer, best known to Disney fans for his Pirates of the Caribbean soundtracks. Zimmer’s pulse-pounding compositions suit a roller coaster well. For IMPACT! he uses a lighter touch, chasing his usual bombast with playful atompunk instrumentation.


Zimmer’s Flight serves as a stand-in for what he might create for IMPACT! (Countdown and blastoff at 2:53)

“Five...four...three...two...BLASTOFF!”

Atomic flames burst beneath the titanium supports! An LSM launch propels rockets blasting forward at 40 miles-per-hour!

Rockets swiftly ascend the steepening slopes of Mt. Helios. G forces intensify. With a vertical climb of exactly 100 feet (half of Mt. Helios’ overall height), this thrilling moment substitutes for a lift hill.

Space Flight!

Smoke clouds fill the launch tube, obscuring sight. Passing through, rockets enter a quick dive down. This moment is meant to simulate sudden weightlessness, since rockets have now passed through the Earth’s upper atmosphere and reached the cosmos!

Most of IMPACT! is located indoors, housed within Mt. Helios. This is a simulated roller coaster flight through outer space...admittedly a similar premise to Space Mountain over in Disneyland. To answer for this, Imagineers strive to make IMPACT! as visually distinct from Space Mountain as possible. These cosmos feature far more physical effects, like stars and planetoids, all stylized Technicolor creations more like a mid-century fantasy of outer space than a realistic portrayal.

Rockets bottom out from their antigravity dip and follow a banked turn left. Rockets twist and dart through the heavens, with blink-and-you-miss-it views of starfields, distant swirling black holes, and the Milky Way. A straightaway affords glimpses of the flaming Asteroid Damocles...our target.

Moon Shot!

A right-turn helix banks rockets around a large, physical Moon. This is the “moon shot” foreshadowed in the queue. The Moon’s gravity boomerangs rockets U-turning back into deep space...directly towards the Damocles.

The Asteroid Damocles!

Rocket trains slow to a stop along an upwards-slanting track. The Damocles is dead ahead, an animated screen effect, flaming and venting off phantasmagoric “oil slick” space gases.

Dr. Diesel on the rockets’ radios issues commands. “Asteroid Damocles dead in your sights...FIRE!”

Nuclear missiles fire from the rockets - fiber-optic cables flanking the tracks depict missiles’ arcs. The weapons impact the Damocles, blowing it to smithereens! Dr. Diesel celebrates over the radio as armageddon is averted -

And the explosive shockwave sends rocket trains hurtling backwards!

Meteorite Shower!

This unexpected backwards section should be a thrilling surprise for first-time riders. Rocket trains follow a switchtrack to the right, then curve clockwise. The coaster sensations aren’t terribly forceful in this section, since traveling in reverse is thrill enough on its own for most guests.

Rockets ricochet backwards onto the surface of the Moon. Flaming meteorite debris from the destroyed Damocles falls on all sides!...Achieved with screens, misters, and briefly-glimpsed physical effects.

The lunar surface doesn’t resemble the real deal. Instead, this is a twisted extraterrestrial landscape straight out of Forbidden Planet, all vibrant colors and unrealistic arches and cracked arroyo riverbeds. As rockets twist around falling debris, they get a momentary glimpse of the Earth rising from the horizon...foreshadowing for the ride’s climax.

Escape Velocity!

Slowing down, rocket trains move through a lunar arch which physically collapses above them. Rockets come to a complete stop within a lunar canyon. Crashing meteorites bedevil the landscape! Gigantic moon crystals physically rise up, shaped like Devil’s Postpile basalt columns! Steam vents fire off! Arches frame a screen effect - a deadly dust cloud closing in! The Moon is collapsing into an apocalyptic fury!

Dr. Diesel’s reassuring voice crackles over the radio. “Emergency fuel reserves activated. Prepare for liftoff in three...two…”

Liftoff! LSMs launch rocket trains forward at 35 miles-per-hour - just enough to reach escape velocity and flee the imploding Moon!

Reentry!

Rockets again rush forward through outer space! While still accelerating, trains maneuver a wide left banked turn while gaining elevation for a climactic drop. Riders feel strong positive G-forces. With great speed, rockets hurtle past scenes of nebulae.

A left-banked upwards helix sends rockets spinning counter-clockwise around a physical Earth set. The helix creates more positive Gs. “Entering” the Earth set piece, trains rush through a heated tunnel! Flame effects and spiraling neon signify reentry! A wall of mist obscures the exit.

Crash Landing!

Rockets burst outside, tumbling downwards from Mt. Helios’ high slopes!

S.K.Y.’s titanium rocket rails form a large funnel, apparently to “catch” the out-of-control rockets. (This is all simply visual storytelling.) The visible tracks carry rockets rushing downslope, into a slot canyon in a forest of saguaro cacti.

Trains perform a spectacular “triple down” maneuver; the tracks level out in between three drops, giving riders amazing airtime! For a family-friendly Disney coaster, this truly feels like a climax!

Splashdown!

Rockets bank hard to the left. Meandering right beneath a Very Large Array of satellite dishes, one final drop sends rockets through a walkway tunnel.

Exiting the tunnel, rockets splashdown into a lagoon! This is a classic coaster conclusion, and it’s also the logical finale to a thrilling tale of space flight.

The tracks pass an astronaut reentry capsule drifting in the waters, complete with floating yellow parachute. An uphill slope sends rockets into a brake run located in between the crater walls and the Guzzlin’ Gremlins B-25 fuselage. A few rocket cars on a side track overflow with shattered moon crystals - treasures from our stellar voyage.

Unload - A Heroes’ Welcome!

Passage under a final land walkway leads rockets back into the VAB for unload...This is actually a second VAB structure, and a separate unload station, but it is dressed to be a duplicate of the loading platform. All the construction clutter is gone now. In its place are celebratory overhead banners reading “Congratulations!” and “Earth saved!”

Riders unload to the right and depart the station down a glass block hallway. TV screens in the walls depict a ticker tape parade for Earth’s returning heroes.

Exit ramps slope gently downwards, beneath the main crater surface. A subterranean control center room features an array of screens displaying on-ride photos, taken on the space launch. Lastly, guests are ushered to the Meteorite Mart post-ride shop. ​

 

[D Hulk]

Atomic Boneyard
E-ticket dark ride

Have a close encounter with fun-loving aliens in a spooky airplane graveyard

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“Greetings, my friends! We are all interested in the future, for that is where you and I are going to spend the rest of our lives. And remember, my friends, future events such as these will affect you in the future. You are interested in the unknown, the mysterious, the unexplainable. That is why you are here. My friends, can your hearts stand the shocking facts about…

...ALIENS FROM OUTER SPACE!”​

Long before the meteorite collision transformed this barren stretch of desert into Cosmic Canyon, the region had already been a hotbed for unexplained phenomena. Travelers would tell of strange lights in the night sky. Of bizarre electrical interference. Government “Men in Black” and hidden airbases. Saucer abductions. Livestock sucked dry. Dominating all of these old wives’ tales, persistent rumors of an alien presence - of “little green men” - would constantly crop up. Conspiracy theories abounded, all of them pointing to one shocking, inescapable conclusion: We are not alone!

It is time now, my friends, time to investigate the mystery behind these unusual occurrences, to charge out into the alien desert on a nighttime Jeep expedition seeking close encounters.

Atomic Boneyard is a haunted house for the Space Age! Every theme park needs a spooky ride. In place of the traditional ghosts and ghoulies, DisneySky plumbs more modern myths of the unknown...fears of extraterrestrials, of what lies beyond this Earth, fears steeped not in Victorian occultism but in Atomic Age anxieties. But fret not! Like Haunted Mansion before it, Atomic Boneyard mixes the playful with the spectral. With its rubbery 1950s monster movie tone and Tim Burton-esque humor, our trackless dark ride makes alien invasions fun for the entire family!

The fun begins at Robertson Air Force Base along the southern outskirts of Cosmic Canyon, nestled against Mt. Helios’ red sandstone foothills. A desert trail winds downwards into an eerie rock canyon, where every boulder and tumbleweed suggests a vaguely alien presence. Barbed wire and military fencing cordons off this top secret government facility...an area the local conspiracy theorists have informally budded “Area 55.” They’ve even named their roadside curio shop after it. It’s by this shop, and under its abandoned Atomoco gas station roof, where FastPass distribution occurs, with gas station pumps service as FastPass machines.

Queue - Secrets of the Lost Air Base!

Guests enter the queue and access Robertson AFB by a military guard house. A descending canyon pathway leads continually downward, downward, downward towards a subterranean bunker built into the rock face. Guests who recall the exterior winding queue for California Adventure’s “It’s Tough to Be a Bug” will enjoy a familiar feeling here.

The bizarre rock formations are less comforting. They combine many Southwestern influences, from Hollywood’s Bronson Canyon (a shooting location for innumerable B-movies) to the Dollhouse in Utah’s Canyonlands. Several sandstone pillars vaguely resemble UFOs; called “Saucer Rocks” in-universe, Utah’s Mexican Hat inspires these.

The wrecked fuselage of a Douglas A-20 Havoc fighter plane - call sign Astral Plane - spans the canyon walls overhead. Passing through this threshold leads to the shadowy canyon depths, where an eerie wind howls. Loose fine sands cover up more skeletonized fuselages - the vestiges of an airplane boneyard. A “Stay Out” sign clangs against a metal gate, evoking Area 51 imagery. Overhead, a single desiccated Joshua Tree stands watch. Weird fossils line the igneous strata, fossils of strange alien beings with three eyes and extended foreheads.

Slot canyon walls give way to reveal the ride’s main facade: A curving Robertson AFB bunker built organically into the weathered metamorphic rocks, like the Doolittle House in Joshua Tree. Eerily spherical rocks vaguely look like alien heads. (The ride’s show building, incidentally, is located entirely within the massive Mt. Helios, sharing space with IMPACT!, In an Ocean of Stars and Flight to the Top of the World.) A hidden fallout shelter door located well below ground level leads indoors…

...into a dank and dark hallway with flickering lights. Into a classified, underground facility.

The Incredible Alien Warehouse!

The hallway leads to a large bunker space, like a version of the warehouse at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark. Queue switchbacks explore a treasure trove of extraterrestrial artifacts. Stacks of crates tower many floors up. Crates bear labels from the world’s many strangest places: “Bermuda Triangle,” “Roswell,” “Tunguska,” “Zerzura,” “Shangri-La,” & “Burbank.” Others bear DisneySky land names. One chained-up crate rumbles - a Creepshow reference. Eerie spectral lights emit from another crate’s slats. Shelving bears an Egyptian “Rosetta Stone” with ancient alien hieroglyphics. A crystal skull glows inside a case. Bizarre New Age artwork lines the bare concrete walls. Sounds of a distant, mournful theremin add a tinge more unease.

The standby and FastPass queues merge at turnstiles leading into another bare concrete antechamber. Newspaper clippings on cork boards fill in details, lightly outlining a sort of Roswell Incident backstory - all about a crashed UFO, a rumored alien autopsy at Robertson AFB, and a government coverup. Star maps lay out the Zeta Reticuli stellar system. Eyewitness alien sketches depict them in the classical “grey” archetype - short, green, with bulbous eyes and large foreheads, all filtered through a softening Disney design aesthetic.

Military-clad cast members hold guests at an iron blast door, giving them time to peruse the clippings. Then, in groups up to fifty, cast members usher guests into a pre-show fallout shelter room...and seal them inside.

Pre-Show - The Alien Awakes!

Like Haunted Mansion’s pre-show, this is where Atomic Boneyard is at its absolute spookiest. The fallout shelter alone is sufficiently disquieting. Scant canned foods covered in dust sit shelved behind meshed screens. A one-way mirror dominates the shelter’s far wall. An antiquated 1940s wooden radio quietly plays bubblegum rock ‘n’ roll, distorted and slowed down. Then the radio flickers and shorts out…

As the bare bulb lights throughout the shelter go haywire, under some strange cosmic influence, the radio dials spin. Music is replaced with news bulletins, with snippets of Orson Welles’ War of the Worlds broadcast and reports of UFO sightings. The radio frequency changes again...to an alien’s voice! A otherworldly voice, somehow at once both booming and high-pitched, lectures in an unknown alien language. This dialogue is peppered with eerily comic laughter. The room’s flashing lights grow increasingly frantic as the alien leader’s speech grows more intense…

Climaxing with the one-way mirror turning transparent! Beyond, a clinical operation room! A green alien lying motionless on an autopsy table! As soon as guests spot this, the lights go out entirely.

There is a loaded pause. Then the lights return.

The alien is now seated upright...its head turning slowly to face guests!

Lights go out again, then return once more.

The alien is right against the mirror glass, pounding viciously!

And with this final heart-stopping shock, the room returns to normal, the extraterrestrial presence somehow vanquished. The radio again blithely plays its period pop. A new doorway is now open, and cast members breathlessly “evacuate” guests to the next room.


Howard Shore’s Ed Wood main theme, which neatly fits the pre-show’s concluding mood

(From entry to exit, this pre-show lasts two minutes - perfectly timed out to maximize throughput while setting the stage.)

Loading - Attack of the Atomic Jeeps!

The aliens are coming! The aliens are coming! With great urgency, guests emerge into a nighttime desert gas station. Lining the walls are freshly-posted military signs designating an “Evac Route.” Window slats look out onto the (indoors) desert beyond, which is inundated by a fearsome howling sandstorm. The structure creaks in the wind.

The guest route emerges to a loading platform under the old Route 66 “Atomoco” gas station roof. Distant wooden fences block views of the eerily blue desert horizon; shadows of dead aircraft beyond anticipate the nearby boneyard. Corny fake 1950s sci-fi movie posters pepper the fence and set the tone. There are little bits of spooky ambiance, like a distant coyote’s cry or boarded-up windows or a constantly sparking bug zapper.

Trackless U.S. military Jeeps gather together in groups of four, here to safely shuttle guests away from the incoming aliens. Each Jeep seats two rows of three each. Four Jeeps dispatch together every minute, overseen by a cast member operating from a pumping station. Atomic Boneyard uses the same smaller-scale trackless LPS system as Mystic Manor and Pooh’s Hunny Hunt, which is better suited to an intimate dark ride such as this.
​

RIDE STATS
Ride type: Trackless dark ride
Capacity per Jeep: 6 (2 rows of 3)
Hourly capacity: 1,440
Duration: 5:30
Height restriction: None​

​

---

Tomorrow, the ridethrough!

 

[Garfield Builder]

I hope so.

 

[D Hulk]

Ride Experience - The Night the Earth Stood Silent!

The four Jeeps all start up with in-vehicle ignition effects. They set off together into the nighttime desert, cornering left around a fence and nearing a sign for “Sanctuary City” - evidently the evacuation destination.

But suddenly the Jeeps’ dashboards all go haywire, overcome by the same alien electrical interference seen in the pre-show. Compelled by a cosmic force, the Jeeps veer further left away from the Sanctuary City sign. The Jeeps shake and spin as they instead go down a dead tree desert road past a marquee for the “Castle Drive-In.” What’s “Now Showing?” A 1950s sci-fi movie title which changes with each ride (from dozens of gag titles dreamt up by Imagineering), with names like The Martian from Venus! or Attack of the Phosphorescent Eyeballs!


Danny Elfman’s Mars Attacks! main theme

The ride’s soundtrack comes courtesy of composer Danny Elfman, who previously collaborated with Imagineering on Hong Kong’s similar Mystic Manor. The Atomic Boneyard soundtrack keeps Elfman’s trademark sinister goofiness, with a hummable hook which will stick in guests’ heads. Elfman’s work on Tim Burton’s Mars Attacks! best matches the spectral spirit of Atomic Boneyard. Expect plenty of theremin and bongos and jazzy lounge influences. Expect a chorus constantly singing “la LA la LA!”

Terror at the Castle Drive-In!

The possessed Jeeps gather before a drive-in movie theater screen, which plays a creepy old B-movie in the vein of It Conquered the World or Earth vs. the Spider. (Hollywood Studios’ Sci-Fi Dine-In is a clear precursor to this ride!)

Suddenly the movie image cuts out. Lights pass behind the screen in the night sky, like UFOs blending in with the stars. The Jeeps escape in reverse, using their trackless motions to scurry like frightened bunnies.

The Phantoms of Yucca Field!

Jeeps reach the aircraft boneyard, a mechanical graveyard in the yucca flats where “dead” WWII-era vessels are abandoned. These rusted, half-scavenged hulks tower overhead physically, and vanish towards the horizon with forced perspective models and painted backdrops...with low lighting aiding in the illusion.

This is a slow, anticipatory portion of the ride, full of dread and buildup. Bent propellers creak in the faint wind. Tumbleweeds roll past. Shifting dune sands reveal a sun-bleached cattle skeleton. Two animatronic vultures loom on the wing of a Lockheed P-38 Lightning. Jeep headlights cut through the pitch darkness, illuminating spooky shark-face “nose art” on a Curtiss P-40 warplane. Distant lightning cracks on the horizon, revealing silhouetted in the clouds what appear to be spectral “ghostriders in the sky.”

Jeeps drift past a row of mailboxes, which all seemingly come to life - flags flipping, doors opening and shutting - in a homage to Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Riders take notice of a starfield effect along the room’s perimeter. Some of the stars improbably move; lights from a trio of distant UFOs are suddenly revealed. Jeeps pull into reverse, afraid, shivering.

Invasion of the Lurking Unknown!

The petrified Jeeps backup to hide an abandoned military base office. There is a brief moment of precarious stillness, as riders take in details like a pinup calendar girl or a trio of Toy Story alien toys as a desktop Easter egg. Then...then UFO light shafts blast through the Venetian window blinds, through the cracks in the doorframe (more imagery inspired by Close Encounters) as the office’s many objects come to life via alien tech! A phone rings incessantly. A desktop fan stops and starts at random. A Mickey Mouse wall clock spins backwards. Toy 1950s robots chatter about.

The Jeeps go nuts too in this electrical storm. Lights blink on their dashboards. Jeeps spin to view an office door. It slams open, revealing a trio of creepy backlit aliens, all elongated limbs casting long shadows. Jeeps recoil from the three “hitchhiking aliens” (a little visual nod to Haunted Mansion) as creepy, physical alien arms reach in like zombies through nearby windows.

They Came from Beyond!

Outside, the Jeeps go, “outdoors” into a circular room with far silhouetted mesas like Utah’s Canyon of the Gods. The room’s lights go out, and three oppressive spotlights shine onto the Jeeps from above. Three physical UFOs spin directly overhead, each emitting a bizarre humming sound.

The Jeeps spin along with the saucers, taking full advantage of the trackless capabilities. The room fades away, transformed into an all-encompassing starfield as only fibre-optic lights in the walls remain. Wind effects rush through riders’ hair, as more spotlights reveal backlit aliens “beaming down” from their spaceships overhead. Around and around Jeeps spin, as more and more mysterious aliens surround them on all sides!

Cosmic Encounters in the Atomic Boneyard!

Surrounded by such imagery, riders barely notice their transition into the next room. Starfield walls swing away, and Jeeps reach the heart of the boneyard!

This is Atomic Boneyard’s centerpiece scene. Like Haunted Mansion’s ballroom when ghosts finally manifest themselves, here the aliens cease to be inky figures in the shadows and become full-fledged physical characters! Like Hunny Hunt’s Heffalump & Woozle scene, here a vast “ballroom” ride space allows several Jeep groups to meander as a group, to dance together tracklessly and peek individually at specialized show scenes! Here, Danny Elfman’s score really kicks into gear! The mood permanently shifts from spooky to kooky, as the expected alien invasion turns out to be a raucous & festive lounge party!

No two Jeeps get the same ride experience. Each Jeep encounters different set pieces. Alien animatronics are everywhere! There is way too much going on in this jolly, alien-infested airfield for one viewing. Some of the sight gags riders might behold include:
​

• A group of hip aliens playing together in a ‘60s-style lounge band upon the wing of a plane​
• Aliens use their massive, mounted “Dis-Integrator Ray” to zap an animatronic cow into a skeleton. Lighting and projection mapping achieve this effect, like the Jack Sparrow skeleton in Shanghai Disneyland. The aliens then use a “Re-Integrator Ray” to restore the cow to flesh. The cow continues to graze nonchalantly.​
• Giant atomic brains float through the skies!​
• One alien in a cowboy hat rides a massive, elephant-sized ant - an homage to the classic Them!​
• Distant, gigantic ‘50s robots (wall projections) tower amidst the distant wrecked airplanes. One robot breaks off a wing and eats it.​
• An alien artist, complete with French beret, ponders its planned crop circles diagram.​
• Oversized peapods sit wedged into a propeller casing.​
• Two Jeeps, each carrying guests, slide sideways while facing each other. One Jeep enters the interior of a fuselage, where a screen suddenly replaces the other guests with a Jeep full of aliens, riding along and waving back. (This effect borrows from Universal Studios’ Men in Black: Alien Attack.)​
• One trackless Jeep vehicle permanently explores this room. Instead of guests, it carries several green-glowing human skeletons. Fellow riders who the aliens zapped, perhaps?​
• Shark-face “nose art” on a row of warplanes sings in unison. This effect is achieved with rear-projection inside the planes.​
• An alien constantly fires its laser beam ray at a target on the side of a WWII fighter plane.​
• Paneling on the same plane’s engine flips open, revealing a nest of animatronic gremlins tearing apart the machinery.​
• Ghostly skeletal pilots appear in their cockpits, fading in and out of reality with a Pepper’s ghost effect.​
• A great big overhead UFO spins in the room’s center, with a frightened mooing cow caught up in the ship’s metal claws.​

Our initial group of four Jeeps eventually works their way to the room’s far end, where a full-scale spaceship UFO has humorously crashed into a sand dune. Spinning to face the ship, the Jeeps enter.

Saucers from Space!

Jeeps rush through a tunnel of glowing neon light tubes. They pause and face the right, peering through an observation window. Beyond in a transporter chamber, the earlier Jeep quartet faces back. Light beam flash, and in an instance the earlier Jeeps have teleported into nothingness!...disappeared with a classic magician’s mirror effect perhaps most famously used in the transporter scene in Las Vegas Hilton’s old Star Trek Experience.

That! The Creature Without Reason!

Jeeps continue inwards, into the UFO’s central control room. There are recessed neon lights, Tesla coil contraptions, and monstrous things floating in vats...this includes an ExtraTERRORestrial cameo. A pair of animatronic aliens operates the spaceship’s controls, which look like a ridiculous combination of Plan 9’s “dictorobitary” and Robot Monster’s bubble machine.

Noticing riders, the aliens fire off a pulse beam. Magenta rings fly at riders within a puff of smoke, complete with a blast of heat.

Forbidden Spaceship!

The pulse drives Jeeps backwards, back into the same teleportation chamber seen earlier, now on the other side. Jeeps turn to face the one-way mirror where the next rider group watches them; from this perspective, a variation on the Tower of Terror mirror effect reflects riders’ ghostly spectral forms back at them.

Then the light show begins, and riders teleport! With a flash of climactic fibre-optic artistry, the Jeeps spin 180 degrees while the chamber’s unseen walls rise up into the ceiling. All of this while Jeeps also sit atop a bouncing platform (like one on Hunny Hunt) to add motion to the moment.

When lighting returns, Jeeps discover themselves not aboard the UFO, but back in the quiet Southwestern desert, in a quiet canyon corridor. A trio of small UFOs silently zooms away in the stars overhead. The teleportation effect is eminently realistic, repurposed from past attractions, yet it should prove to be both a wonderful “how’d they do that?” moment and a fitting climax for the ride.

Unload - The City at World’s End!

The Jeeps casually glide around the “Sanctuary City” town limits sign, and ease into a group of smalltown facades as though nothing happened. This is a separate unloading platform, located in Sanctuary City’s roadside motels and air base storehouses. Cast members greet riders with a chirpy “Welcome, I trust you had an uneventful drive,” wholly oblivious to riders’ close encounter. Riders exit their Jeeps in a bit of a daze, with a confusion typical to alien abductees. Was it all real, or a strange mass hallucination?


Danny Elfman’s Martian Lounge from Mars Attacks! original soundtrack, which fits the uneasy calm of the post-ride hallway

An upwards-slanting concrete bunker hallway leads guests back out towards Cosmic Crater. The blinding bright light of outdoors deposits guests near the Area 55 gift shop. A subtle, spooky blue alien glow emits from grout in the final hallway’s bricks...the last remaining sign of alien activity. ​

 

[Twilight_Roxas]

Since this park is theme to the sky. Ever thought of bringing or acknowledging them?

 

[D Hulk]

Since this park is theme to the sky. Ever thought of bringing or acknowledging them?
View attachment 520003

They're appearing in two days!

 

[Twilight_Roxas]

Sweet.

 

[Suchomimus]

Since this park is theme to the sky. Ever thought of bringing or acknowledging them?
View attachment 520003

Check the third to last bulletin on the list of gags for the Boneyard Ballroom.

 

[Twilight_Roxas]

Page?

 

[Suchomimus]

Page?

This one. You asked after it was just posted.

 

[Twilight_Roxas]

You said Boneyard Ballroom not Guzzlin Gremlins. Lol

 

[Garfield Builder]

DHulk are there any more attractions?

 

[MickeyWaffleCo.]

DHulk are there any more attractions?

There's more coming each day (along with shops, shows, and lands) until we get to the end of the park!

 

[James G.]

I'm trying to find the right combination of adjectives to describe this experience. "Delightfully astonishing" is the best I have so far. "Sensory Overwhelming" is a close second.

 

[Garfield Builder]

I'm trying to find the right combination of adjectives to describe this experience. "Delightfully astonishing" is the best I have so far. "Sensory Overwhelming" is a close second.

How about "Stupifyingly cute"?