ORLANDO, Fla. — Roller-coaster enthusiasts are looking up — and forward — as testing for Orlando’s next thrill rides ramps up at theme parks.
At Universal’s Islands of Adventure, trains for the upcoming Jurassic World VelociCoaster speed along the rail, crest silently for a moment high on the top-hat loop before plunging down into a series of curves and twists, including a dramatic upside-down stretch over water.
“Just by looking at the track, you can just get the vibe that this is going be one of those layout-changing roller coasters in the area, even in the country,” said Sarah Anderson. “It’s going to be one of those things that people travel from all over to try out.”
But before that can happen, testing must be completed. And that includes hundreds of repeated round trips over a coaster’s course. Ride watchers are tested, too. There’s no posted schedule of when or how long builders will perform testing or any way to tell how often a train will zoom by.
“You need to be insanely patient,” Anderson said. “And you have to also be ready for disappointment because it’s not going to run every day.”
There are many vantage points to view the new ride, and they each come with distractions, such as the roar of the Incredible Hulk coaster, the prerecorded spiel from Popeye & Bluto’s Bilge-Rat Barges ride or the energetic music of Marvel Super Hero Island.
At SeaWorld Orlando, trains may be spotted on the track for the Ice Breaker by late next week, a SeaWorld spokeswoman said. This coaster, set to debut this spring, also skirts a waterfront and is easily seen by park passersby. Work could be heard from beyond its construction walls this week.
“Ten months ago, we were doing the exact same thing, the exact same processes where the train was sitting in the station,” said Dan Leavelle, who runs the Midway Mayhem site and monitors coaster construction. “Then they played with the transfer table, and the train moved forward and backward like it did in the new video that I just posted.”
The coronavirus pandemic has disrupted the debuts of Ice Breaker along with Iron Gwazi at Busch Gardens Tampa by months. Walt Disney World continues to work on coasters at Epcot (Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind) and Magic Kingdom (Tron Lightcycle Power Run).
“Let’s be honest, I played with K’NEX and erector sets when I was younger, and seeing large-scale erector sets … I’m a kid again,” Leavelle said. The testing lifts the spirits of other observers as well, he said.
“I think just seeing the coaster actually running now is giving people a sense of hope,” he said. “Knowing that it’s a new attraction and what we’ve gone through in the last year … and that our economy is hopefully going to bounce back here.”
Interest goes beyond the folks physically standing in the shadows of the new rides, said Taylor Strickland, owner of Orlando Informer, a vacation-planning website.
“I think there’s a pretty high level (of interest) around the coaster because people know that’s coming this summer,” he said. “A lot of people either have trips planned or have rescheduled their trip multiple times or maybe they don’t have a trip planned, but they’re just daydreaming about their next trip.”
The site’s VelociCoaster videos and coverage have had more than 4.6 million views since Universal reopened from its pandemic shutdown in June, Strickland said.
His site followed the coaster through major milestones of construction, including completion of the rail, the first train through the loop, rolling in of dinosaur figures and nighttime testing, which show off the LED effects of the ride. Popular videos have been shot from hotels after the theme parks have closed.
“The majority of that coaster is pretty exposed, and I think that’s what is different about this project,” Strickland said. “I think that’s what has created a lot of social-media buzz about it.”
Leavelle said that recording the coaster repeatedly has made it easier to tell if its speed is increasing as well as other developments.
“I think seeing the theming elements come to life is almost more exciting,” he said.
Many media outlets are trying to get fresh looks at the progress, said Anderson, who works for Upstop Media, which makes content for the Coaster Force site.
“There’s a lot of stuff opening in Florida and less happening elsewhere,” she said. “So that’s where you get a lot of people like crowding around these rides … just trying to project it to the masses all over the world that can’t be here.”
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