INTERNATIONAL: As if we didn’t need another excuse to visit Dubai, the city has inaugurated the world’s biggest ferris wheel. It’s part of the city’s strategy to reinforce its status as a major tourism hub in the wake of the pandemic.

In a blaze of fireworks, together with a lavish drone show, the “Dubai Eye” was declared open to the world. By night, a little difficult to appreciate its size, but by day its sheer height is easier to take in. It stands a whopping 250 metres tall. It can take 1,750 people at a time. The only downside to its size, is that you only go around once, on a hair-raising half-hour ride, but that didn’t seem to bother its first visitors:

"It's the largest ferris wheel so pretty excited to be here and to be part of this."

"Yeah, currently it’s the sunset time and we're very excited - it's going to be fireworks, it's going to be crazy and it's going to be history making. It's going to be one of the largest ferris wheels that we're going to see and it's going to be amazing."

“It's the biggest ferris wheel in the world, it's the first day, it's the grand opening and we are lucky to be in the same place."

It is the latest attraction to open in the region's tourism and business hub, after the wax work museum Madame Tussauds opened earlier this week. Dubai is hoping to attract millions to its Expo 2020 world fair, which opened earlier in October.