Photo Sources: All photos are mine

FireChaser Express at Dollywood!

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Opened: 2014 Manufacturer: Gerstlauer Height: 78 ft (24 m) Speed: 34.5 mph (55.5 kph) Length: 2,427 ft (740 m) My most recent ride: 2022

Time for our second Dollywood coaster, and second Gerstlauer coaster in the last two days lol. Even though FireChaser Express is a family coaster and Mystery Mine, which I covered yesterday, is a thrill coaster, I found that I actually enjoyed FireChaser Express a bit more than Mystery Mine.

The two main reasons for that are the smoother ride and more well-rounded and dynamic layout compared to Mystery Mine. Similar to that coaster though, FireChaser Express also has a comprehensive theme throughout. Themed to a Smoky Mountain volunteer firefighting company, the ride's trains have that bright fire engine red color that works great with the ride's green track and lush surroundings. Throughout the ride, you pass through fire towers and past a lot of firefighting equipment. The story of the ride follows the chief of the fire company and town local Crazy Charlie, who owns a gasoline and fireworks emporium.

Halfway through the ride, you hit the ride's main show scene, where you pull into Charlie's fireworks shed, fire effects go off and a giant rocket tips over and points directly at the train. The train is then blasted with steam and launched out of the shed backwards, completing the rest of the course going backwards thanks to the use of a switch track.

Out of all the coasters I've ridden, FireChaser Express is the highest ranked family coaster. There are some coasters higher that can be considered family friendly, but this is the highest on my list that's specifically designed for families. The ride's got a great mix of forces, throwing in both airtime and some laterals, it has both forwards and backwards launches, it's smooth, it's a long ride, it's really the best you can ask for in a family coaster. Just watch out for the line. FireChaser Express doesn't have the best capacity, so it can easily get a fairly long line though. But beyond that, it just helps to add to Dollywood's already great collection of family friendly coasters.

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