BAY LAKE, Fla. – Walt Disney World’s Big Thunder Mountain Railroad is back on the tracks.
Closed since January 2025 for a top-to-bottom refurbishment, Disney announced that “the wildest ride in the wilderness” will reopen May 3, featuring a brand-new track and refreshed passenger trains, carefully designed to preserve the attraction’s classic storytelling and signature energy.
One of the most notable changes: the height requirement has been lowered to 38 inches, opening the adventure up to younger guests.
The reimagined experience takes riders underground into spectacular natural caverns filled with phosphorescent pools and iridescent stalagmites and stalactites — a breathtaking stretch known as the rainbow caverns.
Wyatt Winter, executive producer of Walt Disney Imagineering, spoke about this scene-setter during the ‘Play & Preview’ showcase in August.
“As you’re in here and see this beauty of nature, you hear a crack of thunder that takes over the whole cavern. As the thunder cracks, the entire cavern transforms into this eerie red space that really kind of warns you should not continue in here,” said Winter.
At the heart of it all is the legend of Barnabas T. Bullion, founder of the Big Thunder Mountain Mining Company, who struck gold in the region during America’s early gold rush era.
“As he and the miners are out there, as he rules up the golden fist to try and keep getting all that gold out of it, the mountain is always pushing back. It does not want to let go of its gold, always kind of scaring off those miners in this epic battle between nature and humans,” said Winter.
Big Thunder Mountain Railroad is set to reopen as Walt Disney World continues reshaping its Frontierland area, most notably with the construction of a “Cars”-themed land called Piston Peak National Park.