Daily Park Report: July 26, 2026

Expedition Everest Barely Ran on Sunday — and an Afternoon Storm Closed a Dozen Rides at Once

Animal Kingdom’s headliner coaster was open for maybe three and a half hours all day Sunday, July 26. Expedition Everest went down before 8 a.m., limped back to life late morning, then closed again at 2:29 p.m. and never reopened — an eleven-plus-hour outage stretching to park close. For anyone who built their Animal Kingdom day around the Yeti, that’s the single most important thing to know, and it shaped how the park’s waits behaved all afternoon.

The other headline was the sky. A rain band rolled through between 3:00 and 4:51 p.m. and triggered weather-protocol closures on roughly a dozen outdoor attractions across the resort at once — not mechanical failures, just Disney pulling guests off exposed rides while the storm passed. Temperatures hit 96°F under mostly clear skies otherwise, so this was one sharp afternoon shower rather than an all-day washout.

Animal Kingdom: hot despite the missing headliner

Here’s the counterintuitive part. With Everest sidelined for most of the day, you’d expect Animal Kingdom to feel emptier. It didn’t. Median waits landed at 27.5 minutes, a 5/10 and well above the park’s own recent baseline. Peak hit 45 minutes at noon. With the marquee coaster unavailable, demand piled onto everything else — the rides that stayed open absorbed a crowd that had nowhere else to spend its coaster time. That’s summer-vacation family volume finding the path of least resistance.

Magic Kingdom: a late peak worth planning around

Magic Kingdom also ran a 5/10, but the interesting detail is the timing: waits peaked at 8:00 p.m., not midday. The afternoon storm gutted the ride roster from 3:09 p.m. onward — Seven Dwarfs Mine Train, both railroad stations, Big Thunder, Jungle Cruise, Tomorrowland Speedway and the Fantasyland spinners all closed together — so demand compressed into the evening once rides came back online. Spinners like Dumbo, Magic Carpets, Mad Tea Party and the PeopleMover all doubled to 10-minute posts, modest in absolute terms but a clear sign of guests stacking up on the low-capacity rides while the big ones recovered.

Hollywood Studios and EPCOT: the calm options

Hollywood Studios was the softest park relative to its norm, running a 4/10 with a 30.7-minute median — a touch below its typical rhythm. EPCOT was quietest of all at a 2/10 and a 16.6-minute median, peaking early at 10 a.m. before settling. If you wanted a comfortable Sunday, these two delivered it. Slinky Dog Dash was the one soft spot at the Studios, offline from 4:54 to 7:09 p.m., pushing that evening’s Toy Story Land crowd onto its neighbors.

The downtime picture

The 3 p.m. storm was the day’s defining disruption: a dozen outdoor rides closed inside the same window, so indoor attractions did the heavy lifting for close to two hours. Test Track (130 min) and Kali River Rapids (117 min) sat out most of the afternoon. Beyond the weather, three mechanical outages stood out — Everest’s marathon closure, Slinky’s two-plus-hour evening gap, and Spaceship Earth going down 5:21 to 7:18 p.m. right as EPCOT’s evening crowd arrived. Space Mountain also lost about two hours starting at 4 p.m. Between the storm and the mechanical closures, patient guests who rode indoor attractions during the band and repositioned afterward came out well ahead.

Today’s outlook: Monday, July 27

Our engine calls for a busier day, and it earns some trust here — yesterday it nailed Hollywood Studios exactly and landed within a level everywhere else, though it did undercall a few parks by one. Today it flags Animal Kingdom as the park to avoid at 7/10 (around 30-minute median waits), its busiest read of the week, so get to Pandora and the safari at rope drop or plan around them. Magic Kingdom sits at 6/10 (about 22 minutes), but note its hours are shortened tonight for a Disney After Hours event — that’s a late-night ticketed event, not an early close, so daytime touring is unaffected. EPCOT is your best bet at 4/10 (roughly 27 minutes), with Hollywood Studios matching at 4/10 (about 36 minutes). Watch the afternoon: a 50% rain chance builds around 2-5 p.m., so bank your outdoor rides early and keep an indoor backup ready.

Plan around the storms before they hit

Yesterday’s shower closed nearly a dozen outdoor attractions at Walt Disney World in a single window. Lightning Brain’s predictive weather alerts put you ahead of days like this — giving you time to shift indoors, grab a meal, or reposition before the closures land. The rain chart then shows you when each wave clears so you’re first back in line when rides reopen. Now available at lightningbrain.app and on the App Store!