Disney Declassified: Tales of Real Life Disney Scandals, Sex, Accidents and Deaths by Aaron Goldberg Page A
Authors: Aaron Goldberg
Ads: Link
continue to have them despite advances in technology. Then in December of 2010 a bus killed a pedestrian as he walked in the parking lot of the Port Orleans resort, and as recently as August 2013, a bus hit a stationary car near EPCOT that resulted in another fatality.
Accidents at Walt Disney World aren’t exclusive to just planes, trains, and automobiles; there are boats as well. From the resort hotels to within the parks themselves, boats and ferries are omnipresent at Walt Disney World. It is even a way to get to the illustrious Magic Kingdom. Before we get there, we have to traverse the Seven Seas Lagoon, and sometimes the waters are rough and troubled.
Walt Disney World’s 185-acre Seven Seas Lagoon is one of the gateways to the Magic Kingdom. Ferries shuttle up to 600 guests at a time from the boat launch at the Ticket and Transportation Center to the house of the mouse. The lake is more than just a byway to the Kingdom. Guests can do a number of things from fishing, parasailing, to renting private boats at the lagoon. Sometimes things don’t always go as planned in a boating environment.
In October of 1989, thirty-three-year-old Pat, from Glen Cove, New York, and her son rented a boat from the marina at their hotel along the lagoon. They were going to videotape friends and family waterskiing when tragedy struck. A ferry carrying about 80 people to the Magic Kingdom saw Pat’s boat cross into the path of their ferry. The captain sounded a warning whistle and tried to throw the ship into reverse to avoid hitting them. The accident was unavoidable. The ferry hit the boat as Pat drove right into the front of the ferry. A crewmember and guest dove into the water from the ferry and was able to save Pat’s eight-year-old son, but Pat was killed. Investigators claim Disney was not held negligent in the accident and a wrongful death case was settled out of court.
In April of 2010, there was a similar boat–versus-ferry accident at Walt Disney World. This accident happened in the waterway near Downtown Disney. Barbara, sixty-one years old, of Celebration, Florida and Skipton, England, rented a two-person Sea Raycer boat with her husband at Cap'n Jack's Marina. As the couple set out, they steered into the path of a larger boat shuttling guests. Barbara’s husband, commandeering the boat, said he turned away to avoid the other boat. When the ferry saw the boat coming towards them, the captain put the boat into reverse in an effort to avoid hitting them, but it was too late. The boat went under the ferry, and Barbara was wedged between the two vessels. She was knocked unconscious and suffered a collapsed lung, fractured ribs, and back pain.
Barbara and her husband filed suit against Disney and claimed neither her nor her husband were given any instruction about piloting the boat and had no previous experience boating. Thusly, they should not have been allowed to rent the boat and use it in the waterway. The outcome of this suit is still pending.
Boating accident aside, Barbara should feel somewhat lucky with the injuries she received. Barbara’s accident could have been much more dire, considering what part of the country she was in and the climate. As the accident report detailed, Barbara was submerged into the water of a lake, a lake in Florida no less. In Florida—as with much of the south— during the summer months, a dip in a freshwater lake can be deadly. There is a single-celled amoeba called Naegleria fowleri, known in the media as the brain-eating amoeba that can do devastating things to people’s neurological system.
These little buggers love warm freshwater lakes, something the southeast of America is filled with. In the rare chance the amoeba is present in a body of water, and someone is exposed to it, usually by having the water go up their nose, and introducing the water into their body, the results are almost always fatal. The Naegleria fowleri can invade the human nervous system and brain with a
Accidents at Walt Disney World aren’t exclusive to just planes, trains, and automobiles; there are boats as well. From the resort hotels to within the parks themselves, boats and ferries are omnipresent at Walt Disney World. It is even a way to get to the illustrious Magic Kingdom. Before we get there, we have to traverse the Seven Seas Lagoon, and sometimes the waters are rough and troubled.
Walt Disney World’s 185-acre Seven Seas Lagoon is one of the gateways to the Magic Kingdom. Ferries shuttle up to 600 guests at a time from the boat launch at the Ticket and Transportation Center to the house of the mouse. The lake is more than just a byway to the Kingdom. Guests can do a number of things from fishing, parasailing, to renting private boats at the lagoon. Sometimes things don’t always go as planned in a boating environment.
In October of 1989, thirty-three-year-old Pat, from Glen Cove, New York, and her son rented a boat from the marina at their hotel along the lagoon. They were going to videotape friends and family waterskiing when tragedy struck. A ferry carrying about 80 people to the Magic Kingdom saw Pat’s boat cross into the path of their ferry. The captain sounded a warning whistle and tried to throw the ship into reverse to avoid hitting them. The accident was unavoidable. The ferry hit the boat as Pat drove right into the front of the ferry. A crewmember and guest dove into the water from the ferry and was able to save Pat’s eight-year-old son, but Pat was killed. Investigators claim Disney was not held negligent in the accident and a wrongful death case was settled out of court.
In April of 2010, there was a similar boat–versus-ferry accident at Walt Disney World. This accident happened in the waterway near Downtown Disney. Barbara, sixty-one years old, of Celebration, Florida and Skipton, England, rented a two-person Sea Raycer boat with her husband at Cap'n Jack's Marina. As the couple set out, they steered into the path of a larger boat shuttling guests. Barbara’s husband, commandeering the boat, said he turned away to avoid the other boat. When the ferry saw the boat coming towards them, the captain put the boat into reverse in an effort to avoid hitting them, but it was too late. The boat went under the ferry, and Barbara was wedged between the two vessels. She was knocked unconscious and suffered a collapsed lung, fractured ribs, and back pain.
Barbara and her husband filed suit against Disney and claimed neither her nor her husband were given any instruction about piloting the boat and had no previous experience boating. Thusly, they should not have been allowed to rent the boat and use it in the waterway. The outcome of this suit is still pending.
Boating accident aside, Barbara should feel somewhat lucky with the injuries she received. Barbara’s accident could have been much more dire, considering what part of the country she was in and the climate. As the accident report detailed, Barbara was submerged into the water of a lake, a lake in Florida no less. In Florida—as with much of the south— during the summer months, a dip in a freshwater lake can be deadly. There is a single-celled amoeba called Naegleria fowleri, known in the media as the brain-eating amoeba that can do devastating things to people’s neurological system.
These little buggers love warm freshwater lakes, something the southeast of America is filled with. In the rare chance the amoeba is present in a body of water, and someone is exposed to it, usually by having the water go up their nose, and introducing the water into their body, the results are almost always fatal. The Naegleria fowleri can invade the human nervous system and brain with a
Similar Books
