This is something of an urgent post for those of you planning a visit to DCA in the near future — especially if your plans include a ride on Soarin’ Around the World. In fact, if prior to 9:00am PDT today you’ve created RideMax plans for DCA which include Soarin’, I strongly suggest you create new plans instead!
Disney has begun refurbishments on Soarin’, but rather than close the ride completely, they’re closing one of the two theaters, which effectively cuts the ride’s capacity in half. Rumors are that the refurbishment could run for several weeks.
As you can imagine, the reduced capacity has resulted in some very long waits for Soarin’ recently, as well as extremely reduced FastPass distribution.
We’ve been keeping a close eye on the FastPass return times at Soarin’ over the last several days. To illustrate just how much the refurbishment has impacted FastPass availability, take a look at the chart below, which indicates the latest time at which you could have pulled a FastPass for the three most popular rides in the park — Soarin’, Radiator Springs Racers, and Guardians of the Galaxy. The chart covers Thursday through Saturday of last week, as well as yesterday (Monday):
| Latest FP Availability |
Soarin’ |
Radiator Springs Racers |
Guardians of the Galaxy |
| Thursday, 8/24 |
12:40pm |
2:35pm |
2:50pm |
| Friday, 8/25 |
12:55pm |
2:30pm |
5:25pm |
| Saturday, 8/26 |
1:25pm |
2:50pm |
5:00pm |
| Monday, 8/28 |
1:05pm |
1:50pm |
3:35pm |
As you can see, FastPasses for Soarin’ are now running out earlier in the day than they are for either of the other two rides. (Contrast this with earlier in the month, when despite higher crowds, FastPasses for Soarin’ were typically available until early evening.)
As a result of these drastic changes to the wait times and FastPass availability, it’s very likely that once you re-run your RideMax plan, RideMax will have you either visiting Soarin’ earlier in the day, or getting that FastPass sooner than you might have otherwise.
Of course, we do plan to keep a close eye on the situation and adjust the RideMax estimates back to “normal” once the ride comes out of refurbishment.
So for now, re-run those RideMax plans — and stay tuned here for any updates as the refurbishment continues!
We’re based in Central Florida, and expect to be impacted to some extent by Hurricane Irma. We’re not in the direct expected path of the storm, but may still lose power and/or need time to clean up after the hurricane.
