Mission: SPACE Advanced Training Lab

Mission: SPACE Advanced Training Lab is an interactive play space featuring space-themed exhibits and games for Guests of all ages in the Mission: SPACE Pavilion at Epcot theme park.

Play the Space Race game, little ones can climb and crawl through the tunnel playground, send video postcards to your family and friends, and browse the gift shop, all while waiting for your party to complete their ride experience. This fun, interactive play area will keep the little ones busy while the rest of your party is enjoying the ride. Help your team win in the Space Race game by working as a team. Say hello to family and friends by using the video postcard kiosk! Buy some of your favorite souvenirs, or just sit and wait for your party to get off of the ride!

Mission: SPACE Advanced Training Lab exhibits include:

• Mission: SPACE Race - 2 teams, comprised of both astronauts and ground control, compete to see who can send their rocket from Mars to Earth first
• Expedition Mars - Via a joystick and jet-pack button, explore the surface of Mars and discover the conditions of a planet unlike our own
• Space Base - An interactive play area for junior space explorers
• Postcards from Space - Create and email your very own space-themed video postcard at this kiosk

Touring Tips

• Mission: SPACE Advanced Training Lab is the perfect place to visit after blasting off in Mission: SPACE Attraction, or if you decide not to join in the journey to Mars but still want some space-themed fun.
• Lines tend to move quickly, but it can be 10-15 minutes to get onto one of the non-Space Race activities. The Space Race game may require waiting two or three games before getting on, and each game is 15 minutes.
• Sixty players can join in each 15-minute running of the Space Race game. There are several stations for the 4-minute single player Expedition: Mars game. The Space Race game can be very addicting, especially for those who have a strong desire to play until they win. You must work as a team or else you will not succeed.
• Little ones always have a good time climbing and crawling through the tunnel playground, and guests of all ages can enjoy the gift shop and the video postcard kiosk

Facts

• Opened Januaray 2003.
• As with the Mission: SPACE ride itself, Hewlett-Packard has sponsored the Advanced Training Labs since the attraction opened.

History

The original attraction in this location was Horizons, which opened on October 1, 1983, one year after Epcot. Horizons was an attraction in which the focus was on what it would be like living in the future and past interpretations of what the future would be like. Using an omnimover ride system, riders saw scenes depicting Jules Verne's conception of the future around 1900, then robot servants and flying saucers of the 1940s and 1950s(including a TV playing the song "There's A Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow" from Magic Kingdom's Carousel of Progress. Riders then moved into a theater and saw a 70mm film called Omnisphere that showed a space shuttle launch and a theoretical space colony.

After this animatronic scenes of the future showed crops growing in deserts, living undersea, and a space colony. In a unique feature, the ride concluded with riders voting on which future they would like to see more of.

The ride closed for several years in 1993, but reopened when World of Motion closed to build Test Track from 1996-1998. Once Test Track opened, Horizons closed for good. Unlike other attraction changes were a show building and general track are reused, the Horizons structure was completely razed for construction of Mission: SPACE.