FUN SPOT AMERICA (Orlando, FL)
in Orlando and Kissimmee, FL
http://www.funspotattractions.com
 Park News - (11/17/2024) It looks like several of the new rides announced for the Fun Spot Orlando and Fun Spot Kissimmee have arrived and are sitting in the Orlando park’s overflow parking lot this week.
Check out the video posted by Kingdakev below for a look, including the discovery that the new Tea Cup ride has already been installed in the park. It just hasn’t been opened yet. Thanks to Kingdakev for sending Screamscape the update!
(11/12/2024) Fun Spot America has announced that they will be adding a total of five new rides in 2025 across their three parks. All five rides are SBF-Visa Group creations, and all were purchased from the recently closed The Funplex location in Myrtle Beach, SC.
Fun Spot Orlando will receive a new Tea Cups ride, which will replace the park’s existing Tea Cups attraction along with the introduction of a Mach Fun tower, which is said to be the tallest interactive 360º Flying Jet Ride in North America.
Fun Spot Kissimmee is adding the Swing Around in the Kids section of the park, along with Up and Overboard, an inverted pendulum thrill ride.
Finally, Fun Spot Atlanta will add the golf-themed Hook & Slice family friendly thrill ride.
(11/2/2024) Something new is coming to Fun Spot America according to some semi blurred photos posted on social media. Unfortunately they don’t say which one of the Fun Spot parks this attraction is destined for, but it appears to be a flat ride with seats that kinda resemble those used on a Zamperla Air Race or mini Discovery style ride. More as we find out!
(8/12/2024) A reader sent in a couple of links showing off a couple of rides that the Fun Spot parks in Orlando have currently listed as being up for sale over at IRM Rides.
At the Kissimmee location, they’ve put their Chance Yo-Yo up for sale for $168k or Best Offer and the Orlando location has put their Schwarzkopf Enterprise up for sale for $275k or Best Offer. Currently both rides are still listed as active attractions at both locations.
(6/29/2024) Chaperone policies became very common at theme parks throughout the nation during the peak-pandemic years, inspired by numerous problems with misbehaving youth. Typically parks who put them into place did not allow unattended minors to visit a park without a designated chaperone for the group. Sometimes this was a rule to be enforced on select days, or sometimes just something put in place for the later afternoon and/or evening hours, but those rules would vary from location to location. Throughout the numerous policies and locations, it is worth mentioning that the definition of who is deemed to be a minor (-16? -18? -21 years?) vs who is qualified to be an official guardian or chaperone (18+? 21+?) as well as how many minors are allowed per chaperone ended up creating quite a mixed bag of potential options that you might encounter.
Until now, Orlando’s many attractions opted to stay away from putting a Chaperone policy in place, and likely just increased their security efforts, but that is now changing at a few Orlando area attractions. Fun Spot America announced that effective immediately at their Orlando and Kissimmee locations, anyone under the age of 21 must be accompanied by an adult aged 21+, with each chaperone able to oversee just two underage guests at a time.
(4/13/2024) New Roller Coaster Parts Arrive At Orlando's Fun Spot America
(10/4/2023) The state’s official investigation regarding the accident on the Galaxy Spin coaster at Fun Spot Kissimmee was released this week. The investigation confirmed that the 6-year-old boy rode the Galaxy Spin a total of three times, and on the third ride, he was measured once again before getting on, was riding in the far left seat by himself, but his brother and a cousin were also on the ride, loaded into the two far right seats, leaving an empty seat between them. Video footage showed that the ride operator successfully ensured that his lap bar was lowered and locked into place.
After this the inspection reports that the child attempted to get free from the restraints before the ride even started, and then stopped and settled in again, but as the ride reached the upper level the child successfully was able to get out of his seat and reportedly stood up during the ride just prior to falling out.
(10/1/2023) The Galaxy Spin coaster at Fun Spot Kissimmee has reopened according to the local news, following a closure after a 6 year old boy was found to have been thrown from the ride back in August. According to an initial report, the ride was cleared to reopen shortly after the accident, but Fun Spot has opted to keep it closed in order to best determine the cause of the accident and implement changes to make sure it doesn’t happen again.
According to the findings, it was determined that there was no fault with the ride, and that it ‘was operated in accordance with all the ride safety requirements and manufacturer's operations manual.”
However, new requirements are now in place from Florida’s Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services stating that any child under the age of 10 on this ride must be accompanied by a supervising companion at least age 14 or older.
While no one has yet announced any kind of official ‘cause’ of the accident, these changes do lend support to the rumored report sent in to Screamscape last month claiming that the boy was attempting to stand-up while the ride was in motion, and likely caused his own accident. To date, I have yet to see a report confirming if anyone else was riding with the child at the time of the incident, as there has been no witness report released from another rider.
(9/11/2023) According to a reader who frequently visits Fun Spot in Kissimmee, there have now been revisions to a number of the height requirements on various attractions there, including the bumper cars and funhouse. This is thought to be part of the fallout from the accident from last month where a child fell out and was found on the ground under the Galaxy Spin coaster.
While little has been officially posted about what exactly took place to cause the accident in mainstream media, I have heard it confirmed that the child was indeed riding the Galaxy Spin and fell off mid-ride. While the investigation report is still pending, the early rumor is that while the child was tall enough to ride, they may have obtained security footage showing that he attempted to stand-up mid-ride before falling out, causing his own accident. No word on if anyone else was riding with him at the time. More details are expected to be released soon.
(8/5/2023) It isn’t clear what happened yet, but a six-year old boy was found on the ground under the Galaxy Spin roller coaster at the Fun Spot park in Kissimmee, Florida with serious injuries. This took place on Thursday afternoon and the ride has since been closed until an investigation can determine what happened. The boy was transported to a local hospital for medical treatment.
Galaxy Spin is a spinning mouse style coaster produced by Zamperla that seats riders four-across with individual lap bars. The coaster was actually first built for Cypress Gardens back in 2005 before it was removed in 2008 and sold to Fun Spot who re-opened it in 2009. For whatever reason Fun Spot has changed the name a few times over the years, going from Galaxy Spin to Power Trip Coaster to Rockstar Coaster and now back to Galaxy Spin.
It is interesting to note that the news article only says that the boy appears to have been injured by the roller coaster, but they aren't’ saying exactly how just yet. In fact, they haven’t even confirmed if he was riding on the coaster at all. At just six-years old, he may not have been tall enough to ride by himself, as the official website says riders have to be 48 inches to ride by themselves, and if between 42 and 48 inches they can ride but only with an accompanying adult.
FUN SPOT ORLANDO (Orlando, FL)
Park News - (4/13/2024) A social media post (see below) from Fun Spot America in Orlando shows crews unloading a load of giant wooden crates. At the end we get a peek inside and can make out what appears to be a yellow version of a seat for the Freedom Flyer (Vekoma Suspended) coaster. Given the large number of crates, it looks like they’ve got enough seats there to refurbish the entire train. It is worth mentioning that the original train had blue seats, but has been missing for a bit while the Freedom Flyer has been down for maintenance. The arrival was alluded to the week before in a humorous reel on Facebook where a staff member was pointing to the ride and told they were “not supposed to talk about it!”
I don’t believe Freedom Flyer has a maintenance switch track, so when they work on the train they have to remove it from the tracks. However, it is likely that Fun Spot has purchased a second train in Yellow so they can be refurbishing one train while the other is running for several months and then swap out to work on the other train, thus minimizing downtime.
2024 - Nothing is known at this time...
FUN SPOT KISSIMMEE (Kissimmee, FL)
2024 - Nothing is known at this time...
FUN SPOT ATLANTA (Fayetteville, GA)
2024 - Nothing is known at this time...
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