On May 5, Marc Swanson officially became the new CEO for SeaWorld Entertainment. In an interview with the Orlando Sentinel on May 18 he spoke of his visions and plans for the SeaWorld parks in the future.

It has undoubtedly been a rocky for few years for SeaWorld Entertainment but having now appeared to weathered the storm of COVID-19 things seem to be looking up and Swanson is looking to the future with positivity which is great to hear.

The big news was that Swanson spoke about plans for more thrill rides saying:

“We’re going to continue to have new rides and attractions. Our goal is to have something new in every park every year — and that would certainly include the parks in Florida, We have some things that we can’t obviously announce right now, but I think people will be excited when they see the future plans for not only our Florida parks, but really our parks all across the country.” 

It seems like SeaWorld are planning to invest heavily in new rides in the coming years for its parks around the US.

New rides weren't the only thing Swanson talked about, SeaWorld are going to focus on bringing hotels to a number of their properties saying:

“This is a strategy now that we’ve become more recently focused on executing. We have some land parcels and some other things that could make for some exciting hotel locations either on our park property or adjacent to our parks, It’s something that we would look at across multiple parks ... Nothing specific has been determined, but certainly Orlando would be one that we would consider but same for our other locations.”

Busch Gardens Tampa was also mentioned as a potential park for a hotel as it boasts picturesque views of zebras and giraffes.

Swanson also commented on animal rescue and remarked that animal rescue teams will remain a focus. These teams care for a range of marine animals such as manatees, turtles, dolphins and other animals that are hurt or sick from the wild. SeaWorld plan to continue to showcase and educate guests about Orcas for many years to come as they have younger Orcas that can live for decades. 

Theme park fans are still eagerly awaiting news of opening dates for Icebreaker at SeaWorld Orlando and Iron Qwazi at Busch Gardens. We will keep you posted with upcoming announcements regarding this as well as new rides and hotels at SeaWorld parks. Let us know what type of new rides you would like to see by leaving us a comment below or on our Facebook page. Don't forget to check out the latest deals on our Special Offers Page including Save 4% on SeaWorld Orlando and Busch Gardens Tampa tickets with Tiqets.