If you’re heading to Disney World early this morning, you might be met with some disappointment.
Several things can go “wrong” during any given Disney World trip and totally ruin your plans. You could experience technical issues, not get the Boarding Group for the ride you wanted to go on, or find that Genie+ has suddenly sold out. But today’s disappointment comes in a different form — a ride closure.
Early this morning (at around 9:30AM ET), one of Disney World’s most popular rides was already having a rough start to the day. Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance was listed as temporarily CLOSED on the My Disney Experience app. Seems like the other members of the Resistance will just have to battle Kylo Ren on their own for now.
This isn’t all that surprising since Rise of the Resistance has a LOT of moving parts with highly technical aspects. If one too many parts do not function properly, it can amount to a ride closure. We actually saw it temporarily close not too long ago, and just a few days ago it had a wait time of OVER 5 hours.
UPDATE: We later saw the ride reopen and list a wait time, but when we visited Hollywood Studios around 12:15PM, a Cast Member indicated that the ride was down (again) for technical difficulties and there was no estimate of when it would reopen. Many guests were still within the standby queue, however.
Just a few moments later on February 24th, Test Track also appeared to be temporarily closed based on the My Disney Experience app. UPDATE: The ride later reopened.
Sometimes these ride closures only last for a few minutes, but other times they can stretch on for a longer part of the day — it all depends on what’s happening with the ride.
If you are in the parks and a ride suddenly shuts down without warning, here are some tips:
- Check the My Disney Experience app constantly for updates (if a wait time is displayed, you’ll know the ride has likely reopened!)
- Ask Cast Members outside of the attraction if they know what has happened and if they have a better idea about when the ride might reopen
- Come up with a plan “B” in case one of your must-do rides unexpectedly closes
- Mentally prepare little ones for potential closures by discussing the possibility at home
- Use that closure time to knock other things off of your list, take a break, grab a snack, or otherwise utilize your time in the park!
We’ll continue to keep an eye out for updates on this closure and let you know what we find. Stay tuned for more updates!
What do you do when a ride has temporarily closed in Disney World? Tell us in the comments.
Just got home yesterday from Disney. We’ve gone over 20 times (from Texas) and I can say this is the first time I have been majorly disappointed. We took our 5 yr old grandgirl for her birthday and unless you purchased Genie+, you could not ride any of the best rides for under a 2 hour wait. Try doing that with a 5 year old as we saw many parents struggling to do. Animal Kingdom day we rode ONE ride/ The safari. After over. 2 hr wait, we could not do it again. I hate the way WDW is organized these days…