Dollywood marked its new NightFlight Expedition ride in Pigeon Forge, Tenn., on Aug. 14, setting up the park’s first-of-its-kind attraction for a public opening on Wednesday, Aug. 19. The $60 million experience is the newest major addition at the park and its 11th coaster.
The draw is not just the scale. The ride is built around Cora and Jasper Oakley, the niece and nephew of Ned Oakley, a character made famous on Big Bear Mountain, and Dollywood Parks and Resorts president Eugene Naughton said it was designed to catch people off guard with how different it feels. He called it the biggest thing Dollywood has done, and said riders would be taken on a voyage through Secret Lake.
That distinction matters because the park has spent months talking up the ride as something no one has seen before. Created and built by Dollywood, Herschend Creative Studios and Mack Rides, NightFlight Expedition sends riders through the Great Smoky Mountains before plunging them into a whitewater excursion that uses 500,000 gallons of water. It is also Dollywood’s second indoor coaster, a detail that helps explain why the park has framed it as an immersive experience rather than a standard thrill ride.
The project did not reach this point on its original schedule. It had been planned for a spring opening, but officials said an engineering delay pushed the debut to Aug. 19. That left the park with an opening window in August instead of spring, and it also made the Aug. 14 celebration a marker of how close the ride had come to launch after the setback.
Brie Floyd, who experienced the attraction during the event, said the ride changed in a way she did not expect. The first part felt like a screen-based ride, she said, but the water section surprised her because she had never seen anything like it. Dolly Parton did not attend in person, but appeared by video and said she was keeping everyone informed and that all was going well on the medical end of things. She said she was proud of the new ride.
Passholders can preview NightFlight Expedition from Saturday, Aug. 15, through Tuesday, Aug. 18, before the general public gets in on Wednesday, Aug. 19. The timing leaves Dollywood with a rare mix of spectacle and suspense: a major new ride, a late opening, and one unanswered question about the engineering issue that held it back until now.
