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Mission: SPACE is a motion simulator thrill ride at Epcot. It simulates what an astronaut might experience aboard a spacecraft on a mission to Mars, from the higher g-force of blastoff to the speculative hypersleep.
The attraction opened to the public in a "soft opening" mode in June 2003, and celebrated its grand opening on October 9 with a ceremony attended by Disney CEO Michael Eisner, HP CEO Carly Fiorina and NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe, as well as several NASA astronauts from its many phases of human space exploration (Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, the space shuttle program and two crew members aboard the International Space Station).
The attraction was built on the former site of Horizons, a dark ride that offered optimistic visions of what life might be like in the future. Horizons closed permanently in 1999 after a few years of sporadic operation; construction began on Mission: SPACE shortly thereafter. Industry estimates put the cost of developing the new attraction at US$100 million.
Initially it was sponsored by Compaq, which began working with Disney Imagineers on the design in April 2000. Hewlett-Packard assumed the sponsorship upon its merger with Compaq in 2002. The simulator hardware used in Mission: SPACE was designed and built by Environmental Tectonics Corporation of Pennsylvania with a nearly $30 million contract awarded in February 2000. Environmental Tectonics sued Disney in 2003 seeking over $15 million US alleging failure to pay the full amount of the contract and sharing proprietary design details with competitors. Disney countersued alleging the company failed to deliver according to the contract and increased the cost of the ride by nearly $20 million US. The companies settled in January 2009
Mission Space
Walt Disney World EPCOT Orlando Fl.
Epcot is a theme park in the Walt Disney World Resort, located near Orlando, Florida. The park is dedicated to the celebration of human achievement, namely international culture and technological innovation. The second park built at the resort, it opened on October 1, 1982 and was initially named EPCOT Center. In 1994, the "Center" was dropped from the park's name, and by 1996, the park was simply named Epcot. In 2010, Epcot hosted approximately 10.83 million guests, ranking it the third most visited theme park in the United States, and fifth most visited theme park in the world. (Wikipedia).
This was made at Epcot a few months ago from the Italian Pavilion.
After eating a very tasty tiramisu dessert and while waiting for the fireworks to start, I was fortunate to capture this sunset image.
I would have like to use my tripod and a lower iso, but there wasn't any room available to set up the tripod, so a higher iso and handheld image was the only option available to me. Overall, I'm happy with the image.
Epcot Center - Disney World 2008 - The Hansen Brothers
Epcot Center - Disney World 2008 - The Hansen Brothers
Disney had grandiose dreams of filling World Showcase with a multitude of nations. There were even plans for an outer ring of countries if ever the promenade filled to capacity. But alas, this didn’t come to pass. Epcot opened with nine countries and was later joined by Norway and Morocco. But other nations were well along in the planning stages before they were eventually scrapped for various reasons. Some of these included Israel, Spain, and Equatorial Africa. In fact, Equatorial Africa was so far along in planning that it was actually included as a “future project” on the opening day Epcot map. And during the Disney TV special “EPCOT Center: The Grand Opening Celebration” which aired on October 23, 1982, host Danny Kaye interviewed “Roots” author and Project Adviser Alex Haley about this soon to be added pavilion.
The continent of Africa is made up of many poor nations. And building a pavilion at Epcot is an expensive proposition. So Disney proposed a pavilion that included a collection of African countries, rather than just one. This multi-nation concept would help distribute the costs among several countries. After much searching and many negotiations, Letters of Intent were signed by Kenya, Senegal, and Ivory Coast.
Equatorial Africa was going to be an exciting pavilion and plans for a number of attractions were on the drawing board. The first of two films, “Africa Rediscovered,” would be narrated by Alex Haley and would present the abundant wild life of the area, the history of this region, and discuss modern-day Africa. The second film, “Heartbeat of Africa,” would focus on African music and conclude with a laser show synchronized to the sounds of native instruments.
Another exhibit would feature a large tree house. From its heights, guests would look down on a jungle watering hole bathed in perpetual moonlight. A diorama of trees, boulders, rushing waters, and actual scents of nature would highlight a rear-projection movie of animals advancing to drink in the night.
And of course, no World Showcase pavilion would be complete without live entertainment. So a small amphitheater was to be carved into Disney “rocks” to showcase African dance and music.
The African Pavilion was schedule to open sometime in 1983, but as negotiations continued to drag on, it was decided to build a temporary African placeholder where guests could grab a snack and pick up a souvenir. This was done for two reasons. First, this would pacify guests who had heard about the future Equatorial Africa Pavilion on TV and seen it on Epcot maps. But also, the area between China and Germany is large. Something of interest was needed along this route to help give World Showcase a more completed look.
Unfortunately, the Equatorial Africa Pavilion never came to pass for a number of reasons. First, the political unrest of the region made it difficult to carry on negotiations with the various nations and their less than stable governments. Not to mention, these nations were already squabbling amongst themselves for top billing at the pavilion. Then there was the problem of money. Most African countries simply couldn’t afford or justify spending the amounts needed to build a World Showcase pavilion. However, Disney was able to find one sponsor, a company located in South Africa. But apartheid was a major issue in the 1980’s and Disney thought better of associating itself with this political bombshell. Eventually, the project was shelved. And with the opening of Harambe at Disney's Animal Kingdom, any thoughts of a future African pavilion along the World Showcase promenade probably died as well.
Officially, the African themed area located between China and Germany is known as the Outpost, although many call it African Outpost or Refreshment Outpost. Since the Outpost was constructed as a temporary placeholder, there is precious little information about this area of World Showcase available in books and on the internet. So in order to present you with a backstory, I tried to deduce what the Imagineers were thinking when creating this mini-pavilion by examining the details. Here’s what I came up with.
The Outpost is a small trading center located along a rural roadway somewhere in West Africa. Local merchants bring their wares to the stalls each morning and supply travelers with the necessities of their journey. Part of this story can be seen in the signpost that points the directions to various far-a-way locales – very far-a-way indeed.
African Outpost
Walt Disney World EPCOT Orlando Fl.