Mission: Space

This ride simulates astronaut training for the first manned mission to Mars on the fictional ‘X-2 Deep Space Shuttle’.

There are two versions of this ride, ‘The Green Team’, which is less intense training (Cheryl went on this one), & ‘The Orange Team’ which is more intense training (which Beth & I went on). Disney started to offer the two versions after a couple of people died after riding the simulator, although they died due to unknown, pre-existing conditions & not while on the actual ride itself. We didn’t know this before going on the ride & due to the significant number warning signs throughout the attraction cautioning that, "people who do not like enclosed spaces, spinning, or are prone to motion sickness should not ride", & other signs warning, "that this ride may cause nausea, headache, dizziness or disorientation, and that people prone to motion sickness, or who have a headache or an inner ear problem, or who have a history of migraines, vertigo or elevated anxiety also should not ride", Cheryl chose the ‘gentle’ version. I just thought that these signs were the usual overstatements for something that wouldn’t be that bad – after, all this was EPCOT, a Disney ‘family’ theme park?

The simulator starts with the usual pre-ride & video where the four riders in each group are assigned a role (navigator, pilot, commander or engineer) and given two tasks to complete during the ride (probably to take your mind off the nausea, sickness, & other general uncomfortable feelings during the ride). The ‘Autopilot’ will complete these tasks if the rider can’t – eek!

You enter your shuttle through a small door on one side, squeeze into your seat, & strap yourself in, tightly! At first, you can’t reach the buttons for your tasks but then the entry door is closed & no sooner are you plunged into darkness when the entire front of the ride swings towards you so that you are now practically jammed into the ride! The mission starts with liftoff, a slingshot around the moon for a gravity-assisted boost, a brief period of simulated hyper-sleep (to pass the time to travel to Mars) & the landing descent on the Martian surface. Since this is a training exercise, the mission contains, of course, contains several unexpected situations to add to the drama.

This sounds tame but OMG! The ride is actually a huge centrifuge, which spins you around at 2.5G! Since your capsule is totally sealed & all you can see is the massive screen in front of you (which displays the animation for the ride) you can’t appreciate the fact that you are crazily spinning around & just feel the huge positive G-forces when accelerating & negative G-forces when landing. Your capsule also tilts & pitches during the ride. I’m glad that I rode the full version of the simulator with Beth, but it took me about two hours to recover from the ride. According to Cheryl, when I came out of the ride I was sweating profusely & looked green, whereas Beth was jumping about & wanting to ride the simulator again! Still, I could have been a lot worse – when using the restroom after the ride, one of the other riders came in, went into one of the stalls & proceeded to be sick for at least five minutes.