Status Closed Closing date 1993 Closed 1993 Capacity 1,200 people/hour | Opening date 1987 Designer Tussauds Studios Opened 1987 Duration 7 minutes | |
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Similar Tomb Blaster, Runaway Train, Rattlesnake, Bubbleworks, Dragon Falls | ||
The 5th Dimension was a dark ride at the Chessington World of Adventures Resort in southwest London, England, when the theme park opened and was the first major special effects attraction of its kind in the UK. Its narrative followed the character of TV repair robot Zappomatic and the show was designed by Madame Tussauds Studios. The ride closed at the end of the 1993 season and was replaced by Terror Tomb, which in turn has been replaced by Tomb Blaster. The ride was designed with cars that could stop and rotate to face what was happening in the scene; the same transit system is in use today.
History
The ride opened in the summer of 1987 and was sponsored by Hitachi. It went through several script revisions and technical changes in its first seasons of operation. Riders were taken through large sets depicting Zappomatic's journey through the computer-generated "fifth dimension" to find and defeat a monstrous computer virus named The Gorg. The scenes featured animatronics and pyrotechnic effects.
Upon its initial opening, The 5th Dimension was considered a failure by the park because it did not meet guest popularity expectations. The ride was extensively redesigned for its second season to make the story more appealing to visitors, allowing the ride to operate for another six seasons until being replaced in 1994 by Terror Tomb.
