Disney resort custodian says he warned managers they should have fences

[pnwmom]

between guests and the alligators.

And "officials" now say the family wasn't wading in the water -- they were sitting on the shore.

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/business/tourism/os-disney-alligator-history-20160615-story.html

Grand Floridian custodian Mike Hamilton was so concerned by alligators occasionally swimming up close to the shore of Walt Disney World's Seven Seas Lagoon, he said he warned managers they should fence off the area.

"There are signs that say, 'No swimming,' but no signs that say gators and everything else in this lake," he said.

SNIP

San Diego attorney David Hiden told the Orlando Sentinel on Wednesday that last year he whisked his son to safety at Disney's Coronado Springs after a gator approached the boy playing in calf-deep water. Then Hiden saw a second gator nearby. Hiden said a hotel manager called one of them a "resident pet" and seemed unconcerned.

SNIP

Alfred Smith of Charleston, S.C., said he alerted a Grand Floridian employee Tuesday night after seeing a gator in the lagoon. He thinks it's the same one that attacked the boy less an hour later.

"I did warn another family of three that had small kids too close to the water and they along with another family took their children and left," Smith said via email.



http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/breaking-news/os-child-dragged-alligator-disney-20160614-story.html

In response to reports the family was watching a hotel-sponsored movie near the shore, Disney said it hosts such events but believed the film ended before the attack. The family was sitting near the shore, not swimming or wading in the water, officials said.

[JI7]

1. if this is true Disney well have to pay big

[winstars]

2. Nothing they could/will pay will replace the poor child.

[JI7]

3. of course not

I just mean this is evidence that Disney was warned.

[jberryhill]

4. No, but they will have long term therapy expenses

And if Disney is liable, then their insurer is going to be looking to put Disney on the hook.

That's what most lawsuits are about - which insurer is going to pay.

[steve2470]

5. I would hate to be the therapist for that family

Last edited Wed Jun 15, 2016, 11:21 PM - Edit history (1)

What can you say to that family ? I'd be at a loss for words.

[jberryhill]

6. Well, that's why they are professionals

[steve2470]

8. I would damn sure stay away from any religious or spiritual kind of "explanations"....because....

to my mind, there is no acceptable explanation, besides gross negligence on Disney's part. The family wasn't negligent, not to my mind anyway. I'd focus on letting them talk and grieve. Talking about a lawsuit would also undoubtedly be part of therapy, as well as talking about procuring competent counsel.

Yes, no amount of cash can ever replace a beloved child, but it's a lot better than nothing at all or some forced apology from Disney, and can help make the family's life (and their surviving child's life) better in the years ahead.

So, yea, I'd have some idea what to say. Absolutely no religious or spiritual nonsense, that's for sure. They can talk to someone else brave or foolish enough to go there.

[cwydro]

10. Therapists are about listening.

Not talking.

[steve2470]

12. They are about both

The trick is to know when and how much. I'm a therapist, I know. Nuff said.

[cwydro]

17. Ok.

I know too.

[nolabear]

34. Me too. People wouldn't believe what we listen to every day.

Those poor people. I hope they find some peace but there's just no fixing this kind of pain.

[pnwmom]

50. There is not. My parents had a sudden loss of a baby

and the sadness never goes away. And their situation wasn't as horrifying as what happened to this family.

These parents will never be able to wipe those moments from their mind. And their older children won't be able to, either.

[Travis_0004]

11. From a legal perspective, I'm sure they could win a lawsuit

From a PR perspective, I'm sure they will settle out out court.

[steve2470]

13. nvm self delete nt

[HooptieWagon]

56. No way Disney lets this get into a courtroom.

They'll pay anything to keep it out of public records and media.

[steve2470]

7. I have to give the Orlando Sentinel credit for doing these reports

Granted, it would be subject to cries of cover-up and being Disney's lap dog if it didn't, but hey, Disney is the largest employer in the area. It would be easy for Disney to lean on the OS and try to get them to shut up. I'm sure they already have. If memory serves me correctly, the Chicago Tribune still owns the OS.

[ohnoyoudidnt]

54. Disney does use its influence when it can to prevent negative publicity about Orlando.

Have you ever wondered why you have never seen an episode of COPS in Orlando?

It certainly isn't because there is a lack of crime.

[steve2470]

55. excellent point, yes nt

[mountain grammy]

9. If the resort knew there were gators in the lagoon, guests should be warned.

Negligence for sure. My heart goes out to this family. Could happen to anyone.

[Iggo]

29. "...resident pet..."

[Raster]

14. Sue the snot out of Disney. If an alligator was able to snatch a child off of the shore...

...there should have been major signage warning of such.

I guess Disney World will no longer be the happiest place on Earth for this family. Bless their hearts.

[MerryBlooms]

15. Heard on our local Chicago WGN that there have been 5 gators removed so far.

[pnwmom]

16. It killed me to hear that that hotel manager referred to an alligator

as a "resident pet."

The management wasn't taking the risk seriously. At all.

[quaker bill]

18. Gators are ambush predators

snagging prey from the water's edge is how they feed themselves. I am an environmental scientist who works around Orlando. I wade in swamps that have gators in them. I am large enough to be seen as a threat, rather than a prey item by most of them. A two year old child is smaller than some of the wading birds and small deer that they take as prey. Gators are really fast for the first 50' or so and can hide on the lake bottom motionless for 20+ minutes waiting for prey to come into strike range, then come out of the water like a bolt of lightning.

Even I will stick to boats when in waters where the large ones hang, as I might seem like prey or a territorial competitor to a 12+ footer. In mating season (started some weeks ago) the big boys will take chunks out of each other if territory lines are crossed.

Gators have a very tiny brain. It operates like a 4 function calculator. If not asleep and they see something they then run the equation - - do I eat it? mate with it?, fight with it?, or run from it? One of the four gets a yes answer pretty much every time. Basically all of gator life falls within the answers to this set of questions. Three of the four answers are not good for a person.

Needless to say, making sure tourists and gators remain separate, unless the visitors want to go eco-tourist intentionally with an experienced guide, will always be a great idea.

[pnwmom]

19. So I'm guessing you'd have advised the resort they should at least

have had signs warning about the risk of alligators?

And maybe not have organized "Beach Nights" at the water's edge? Or viewed the alligators as "resident pets"?

I just feel sick knowing the nightmare that poor family went through. And they'll never really get over it. Nothing the resort pays them will ever heal that wound.

[quaker bill]

21. Alternately "manage" the gators

Back in the day when they were endangered or threatened, the gators would have been relocated. Today with more than a million of them around the state, there is no empty place to relocate them to, so they are just harvested by licensed trappers. Gator nuggets have to come from somewhere.

Early on, the harvesters made enough from each hide and butchered tail to pay them for their work. Today harvested gators are so common that the value of the animal does not pay enough to support the trappers, so they charge a fee. The work is generally done at night as it is easier to spot them by the red eye shine...

The Everglades has signs "No Swimming - - - Please don't feed the Alligators" Some here understand that this is a single thought, others from elsewhere may think it is two different instructions. Of course it is wise to never feed alligators, even if you are not swimming to put yourself on the menu. They have very small brains and once they associate the sight of a human form with eating, bad things will always happen.

Yes, if you are not harvesting them quite regularly then signs would be a really great idea. Gators don't take people often, but it is big news every time.

[Adrahil]

23. Disney has a full time team which deals with gator sightings and other wildlife incidents.

Any gator reported near guest areas is searched for and euthanized if located. This was reported on MSNBC earlier.

[quaker bill]

25. good.

I don't go out there much, but it sounds like the right plan.

[pnwmom]

26. So they knew of the risk but didn't inform the guests with signs at the water.

"No swimming" in many places means a resort doesn't want to be responsible for accidental drownings. It doesn't mean "no swimming, no wading, and don't even sit on the beach or an alligator might get you."

[Adrahil]

27. I won't say they shouldn't post signs, but...

millions of people have visited without incident.

I think you'll see them post more explicit signs now, but this does not appear to be negligence to me.

[pnwmom]

30. It sounds like negligence to me, when they are not only not posting

danger signs, but allowing guests to feed them from their balconies, and telling other guests that they are the "resident pets."

And holding "Beach Nights" by the shore.

Why should we expect Nebraska visitors to understand there was a serious risk in sitting on the beach by the water for a night-time event planned by the resort?

[Adrahil]

39. "serious risk"?

No other guest EVER has been killed by a gator there.

When I was there last year, the staff explicitly told us not to go near gators and to definitely not feed them. In fact, they told us to report gators to the front desk immediately (our room was along the water).

[pnwmom]

41. I didn't say that it was common. I said that the risk was serious -- i.e., there

was a small but real chance of a serious, even fatal, injury.

[Adrahil]

45. Okay. It's what I'd refer to as a

1/5 risk. It has catastrophic consequences, but is extremely unlikely to happen.

In any case, I expect a lawsuit will be forthcoming, though I expect Disney will seek a settlement. I mean, who doesn't feel for that family? They can't bring their boy back, but I suspect they will ensure the other kid is set for life. Small consolation, but the only thing they can really do.

[jberryhill]

35. The gator population is not what it was 45 years ago

[JI7]

67. it is negligence if what is posted in the article in the OP is true

[yardwork]

20. Thank you for this post.

I've been wondering if it is possible to avoid occasional alligator attacks. They seem to be everywhere in Florida. Is there any way to completely protect people?

I live in NC and we have a lot of sharks off the coast. They occasionally tangle with people. This never ends well. But people still swim in the ocean.

[quaker bill]

24. Avoid them all, probably not

alligator attacks were unheard of when the species was on the endangered list. They had been hunted down to a very small population and the endocrine disruption from DDT and DDE created sterile males in many places. The banning of the pesticide and hunting for 20 or 30 years has resulted in a massive rebound. Large population of big gators can be found in most large bodies of water anywhere in the state.

Considering the amount of close contact between humans and gators, the attacks are quite rare. The attacks mostly happen during this time of year (mating season). Some of this may be prey seeking, but I would bet a lot of it is territorial. You can observe plenty of gators missing legs or chunks of tail from these battles, and they seem to survive the massive wounds they at times give each other just fine.

The Disney attack has the hallmark of a gator taking prey, as I have seen them do just exactly this with ducks and wading birds on a number of occasions.

[jberryhill]

36. "Three of the four answers are not good for a person."

To be clear, which three?

[steve2470]

61. I'm thinking the mating with humans is not good for either man or beast

[quaker bill]

83. only one has the gator leaving

[jberryhill]

91. But he said he loved me!

[quaker bill]

96. From what i have seen, they play rough.

[Adrahil]

22. C'mon.... we cannot live a risk-free life.

MILLIONS have visited Disney resorts without getting killed by gators. This was a terrible incident, but in this case, no one is to blame that I can see. Maybe more evidence will emerge, but I doubt it.

[pnwmom]

28. So, if this $76 billion dollar corporation did a risk/loss calculation

and decided that they'd rather absorb the occasional loss of a human life than make their guests uncomfortable by posting "Danger -- alligator" signs. . .. . would that be that okay with you?

[Adrahil]

32. I'm a systems engineer....

I do risk assessments all the time. NOTHING is completely safe. There is ALWAYS a point at which we say we have an acceptable level of risk. We all do this every day. Every time we go out front door, we are at risk. We make an internal risk assessment and determine the risk is acceptable.

I think expecting a company to spare no expense to make every activity COMPLETELY safe is unreasonable. Now, if they knew there was a particularly troublesome gator in the area and they did nothing, that would be a problem. But if they were taking reasonable precautions (and the injury rate indicates they were) we cannot assume one incident means that they were at fault.

[pnwmom]

33. You're not answering my question. If they deliberately chose not to warn about the alligators

on the signs they put up, would that be okay with you?

It wouldn't have cost them any more to put up a sign that had an alligator warning. And they knew there was a risk, because they have acknowledged that they were "managing" it. But shouldn't they have also given their guests adequate warning?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2016/06/15/legal-experts-did-disney-do-enough-to-warn-its-guests-about-alligators/?utm_term=.edf0c86cf11d

Alan Sykes, a professor at Stanford Law School, said the Walt Disney Co. could be held liable for the incident if there is proof of negligence.

“The hotel owes a duty of care to its customers to take reasonable measures to make the premises safe,” said Sykes, who stressed that he didn’t know all the details about the incident in Orlando. “That would include if there are hidden hazards in a lagoon on the hotel property.”

He said a key question would be whether the resort had prior knowledge of alligators in the water near the hotel and what it had done to mitigate that issue, or at least adequately warn tourists of the potential dangers. “A simple ‘no swimming’ sign might be deemed insufficient,” he said. “If it gets litigated, it’s most likely a case about reasonable warning.”

SNIP

Matt Morgan, an Orlando attorney who has litigated numerous negligence cases against Florida theme parks, agreed that any case would turn on a couple central questions. “What did Disney know about the presence of alligators and when did they know it? What protections were in place for these visitors?” he said. “If Disney knew and did not take steps to warn visitors, they could be liable.”

[Adrahil]

37. I'd need to know more.

Of course there was a risk. This is Florida and near water. That means gators are a possibility. But the risk has been EXTREMELY low. To me, it seems they were managing the risk pretty well. If I were managing the effort, I would certainly add the signs, but that doesn't mean I think they were somehow responsible here, either.

In just about every incident where someone gets injured at a place like Disney, some people will assert negligence. Sometimes they are right. But not every time. I'm not seeing it here.

[pnwmom]

47. They had tables and chairs right at the edge of the lagoon, which invited

guests down there. And they held a nighttime event by the lagoon.

Even though they had to know that nighttime is feeding time for the alligators.

How can this not be negligent? How did they not have an obligation to warn guests of the alligators they were "managing"?

[adigal]

97. The Orlando paper said a man reported a gator an hour before the attack

And there's a video posted on DU and some sites of a gator close to shore right in that lagoon area with just its eyes showing.

Disney knew and calculated just as you said. I'd bet my next mortgage payment on it.

[jberryhill]

43. You are completely missing the point of who picks up the tab

So, tell me. You design a system which, one in 500,000 times results in the loss of someone's arm.

Who pays for that?

We do not have a system of universal health care, and we have a ridiculous social safety net.

As a consequence of that, we use the legal system to primarily determine whose insurer is financially responsible for the, yes inevitable, undesirable results.

That's what this discussion is about.

Yes, shit happens. But saying "shit happens" does not get the bills paid when it does happen.

The alligator population is significantly larger than when this place was designed and built. Their operating assumptions have become invalid.

[Arazi]

52. 17 million +/- visit Disney World annually. Nobody's been eaten before

And the only other recorded alligator incident happened in 1986 when a boy was bitten.

Not saying Disney isn't in trouble for not posting warning signs, but realistically the odds of a fatality by alligator at Disney World have been zero til now since they opened 45 years ago

[jberryhill]

63. This facility is 28 years old and has not had that many visitors

Last edited Thu Jun 16, 2016, 12:57 AM - Edit history (1)

There are 300 million people in the country. Overwhelmingly, nothing untoward happened to any of them today. Severe injuries and accidental deaths are rare events.

However, there have not been 17 million guests at this facility. This facility did not exist 45 years ago, and the population of alligators has increased significantly.

This facility is 28 years old, not 45. It opened in 1988. It has not had 17 million toddler guests in 28 years. If this is representative of your risk assessment calculations, then may God bless your systems and all who sail in them.

It is the mating and migration season for alligators. It happens once a year. That means the total sample space for the risk assessment here is 18 events.

You are making a false comparison. The theme park does not have a freshwater beach with no barriers in it. That risk is unique to this facility.

[TeddyR]

71. No idea how many guests Grand Floridian has had over the last 18 years

But that resort is consistently at capacity, not to mention the hundreds (if not thousands) of folks who visit each day to eat at one of the numerous restaurants there or simply tour the resort. Moreover, it is located on the same lake as the Polynesian and Contemporary resorts, both of which are older and have similar or greater capacity, as well as the Wilderness Lodge, which I believe is newer. Not to mention the other Disney resorts like Yacht Club, Beach Club, Port Orleans, and Coronado (and there are several more), which are located on similar bodies of water in the area. In other words, thousands, if not tens or even hundreds of thousands, of guests go through these resorts on an annual basis. And as far as I know there was only one other similar incidence and that was over a decade ago.

[pnwmom]

86. I've read that other non-Disney resorts do have signs warning of alligator danger. n/t

[Arazi]

73. Have you been to Disney World? There's lagoons, canals, ponds

all over. Every "facility" like the Wilderness Lodge or the Grand Floridian are actually connected by canals and people can take a boat tour of the park's facilities and surrounding areas.

https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/guest-services/water-transportation/

So for me, extrapolating the risk for the whole park makes sense. There's alligators in all of the water areas. Everyone there is exposed to that risk daily and everyone is exposed to the enhanced risk during mating season.

I don't believe alligators only attack when theres a beach. Do you have a link that they need a beach to attack?

But I'm not a lawyer so there's that.

[jberryhill]

76. Yes I've been there

And being in a boat versus a stretch of open beach a few feet away from a playground is an entirely different risk proposition.

The number of visitors to the park, broadly defined, has nothing to do with the risk encountered at this facility.

[pnwmom]

87. They attack when they're hungry and something the right size gets their attention.

If a human, especially a small human, is on a beach near the water, he is at risk from an alligator in the shallows.

People in Florida know this but most people at Disney aren't from Florida.

[radical noodle]

78. 28 years old

1988 to 2016...

[jberryhill]

79. Argh. That's what thumb typing does

In any event, not 45

[pnwmom]

85. I want you to be my lawyer next time I run into an alligator.

[pnwmom]

84. They shouldn't be able to make the decision to withhold this information

from the guests, who come from all over the world.

Post the same signs that are at other non-Disney resorts and at State Parks, letting guests know that alligators may be nearby and are dangerous.

Let the guests decide how close they want to get to the water, knowing the risk.

[Adrahil]

53. your argument seems to be...

That any failure is the fault of the provider. That is not a reasonable standard IMO. The custimer does assume some risk themselves. And as long as the designer/operator is applying a reasonable standard and exercising due diligence, some of that risk is carried by the consumer.

[jberryhill]

60. Then you didn't read what I wrote, quite obviously

No, what happens in the world outside your cubicle is that insurance companies square off in a dispute to determine how to assign financial liability for failures.

"as long as the designer/operator is applying a reasonable standard and exercising due diligence"

And whom do you propose makes that determination?

[Adrahil]

62. If there is a question, it can be the court.

In many industries, we have some estalished standards. In aviation it's "seven nines,". That is, we accept the risk that failure can occur 1//10,000,000 times. Yes, that means ther is a point at which we say we are "safe enough."

[Mariana]

51. Of course it can never be completely safe.

But you do try to reduce the risk. All alligators are inherently dangerous, particularly to children. Everyone knows this. Yes, alligator attacks are rare, but they aren't nonexistent so you know it is a possibility. So, if you have thousands and thousands of children visiting your place, and you have alligators in your body of water, you take steps to make sure the alligators and the children don't interact. You don't just let the kids hang out at the water's edge, looking like lunch. You put up a fence. Of course some kid (or adult) may climb the fence and get killed, but if that had happened here we would be having a very different conversation.

[jberryhill]

70. comparing visitors to the theme park is a false comparison

This poster is making a false comparison.

This resort opened in 1988, and has an expanse of freshwater beach. It has been there for a total of 18 alligator mating and migration seasons. That is the extent of experience with this facility - 18 events involving hundreds of appropriately-sized children.

This poster doesn't want you to look at that. This poster wants to make a false comparison to the theme park that does not incorporate any facility remotely resembling what they built into this hotel 18 years ago, and has most definitely NOT been visited by millions of people of a size attractive to alligators.

[TeddyR]

72. As I mentioned above this isn't correct

Or at least not completely correct. Yes, the specific resort only opened about two decades ago, but the Polynesian and Contemporary, which are just a short walk away, have been open for longer on the same body of water. And the Wilderness Lodge is also on the same body of water, not to mention all the other Disney resorts that are on similar water ways. With respect to the statement that there have only been "hundreds of appropriately-sized children," I'm not sure you've been to Disney. There are at the very least HUNDREDS of children in this age group at Disney resorts each week. You can't avoid tripping over all these kids when you are there.

[jberryhill]

74. There are 847 rooms and 147 villas at this facility

Alligators stop feeding when the temperature is below 70, and as cold blooded animals are not as active in the winter as in the summer. So the risk is not uniform throughout the year.

[TeddyR]

75. That sort of answers my question

I've been to Disney in January, March, May and October, and it is rarely below 70, even in the winter, and never consistently so (except at night in winters). But that doesn't address the fact that there are numerous resorts located on numerous bodies of water, all of which are potential homes to alligators. I'm not excusing this fatality, simply saying that you are using too limited a data point.

[jberryhill]

77. I know it hasn't been there for "45 years"

As claimed upthread.



That's the air temperature. I could be wrong, but I believe alligators spend considerable time in the water, the thermal mass of which makes the average 24 hour temperature more significant than the daily high. The nighttime lows are not consistently above 70 for much of the year.

[pnwmom]

88. The Polynesian is lucky it didn't have its own event in April.

And there have been other alligator sightings at the Grand Floridian.

We can only wonder how many near misses there have been.

http://www.torontosun.com/2016/06/15/canadian-family-also-recently-ran-from-alligator-in-same-lagoon

The frightening episode happened in April.

A British family told the U.K. Mirror they were sitting on the beach of the Polynesian Village Resort, on the Seven Seas Lagoon, with their two young children when the gator clamoured out of the water and onto the sand.

Though the younger daughter of Carl and Karen Davis said she thought she heard something in the water earlier, it was the Canadian family sitting nearby who saw the creature first and ran.

"We sat there for a while longer and dismissed (our daughter's) concern," Carl recalled in the Mirror. "The next thing, the Canadian family sitting a little way up ran over and shouted, 'Alligator!'

"It was directly in front of us, around 40 feet away. It lurched out of the water and we had to run. It was pitch black with no lighting on the actual beach section ... Our daughter was screaming, she was petrified."

And "officials" now say the family wasn't wading in the water -- they were sitting on the shore.

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/business/tourism/os-disney-alligator-history-20160615-story.html

Grand Floridian custodian Mike Hamilton was so concerned by alligators occasionally swimming up close to the shore of Walt Disney World's Seven Seas Lagoon, he said he warned managers they should fence off the area.

"There are signs that say, 'No swimming,' but no signs that say gators and everything else in this lake," he said.

SNIP

San Diego attorney David Hiden told the Orlando Sentinel on Wednesday that last year he whisked his son to safety at Disney's Coronado Springs after a gator approached the boy playing in calf-deep water. Then Hiden saw a second gator nearby. Hiden said a hotel manager called one of them a "resident pet" and seemed unconcerned.

SNIP

Alfred Smith of Charleston, S.C., said he alerted a Grand Floridian employee Tuesday night after seeing a gator in the lagoon. He thinks it's the same one that attacked the boy less an hour later.

"I did warn another family of three that had small kids too close to the water and they along with another family took their children and left," Smith said via email.

[TeddyR]

93. We've stayed at the Poynesian

And Port Orleans and Yacht Club, and have seen alligators at various places in Disney World. I always sort of knew they were around but never thought about an attack.

[pnwmom]

94. When a resort manager describes an alligator as a "resident pet,"

what reasonable person can blame tourists from out-of-state for not realizing the danger?

[TeddyR]

95. Yeah

Not defending (or attacking) Disney. Just noting that in our multiple trips to Disney we knew that alligators were in the water in the area but alligator attack was the last thing on our minds. And having lived in Atlanta, we knew that south Georgia and all of Florida have LOTS of alligators, and just about any significant body of water will have some. But all the gators we ever saw at Disney were really small, like smaller than 2 feet.

It isn't just gators though - a lot of people don't realize that Disney also has tons of snakes (really). I've got some pictures on my phone from our last trip of our daughter rescuing a small ring neck snake from a walkway at Epcot. The entire park is basically built on a swamp. The monorail ride from the Ticket and Transportation Center over to Epcot crosses over acres and acres of undeveloped swamp.

[rusty fender]

66. All gators are troublesome

There were 5 gators in that lagoon. It doesn't look like Disney took any "precautions".

[dflprincess]

48. This is what I don't understand

Disney has a reputation of going to war if there is any reason to even suspect a bed bug might be in a room. It falls all over itself making sure all the guests' items are steam cleaned and, of course, they get a new room. Sometimes people come back from a day at the parks to find their room has been changed and their belongings cleaned because the maids are taught to look for the tiniest sign of bugs. Nobody leaves "the happiest place on earth" with bugs if Disney can help it. (This is in contrast to many other hotels that apparently, couldn't care less. Also smart as is helps prevent a major infestation.)

But they didn't take the alligator threat seriously?

[tblue37]

81. When Ford did that sort of risk assessment with the Pinto, they ended up in big trouble. nt

[BootinUp]

31. I'm pretty shocked at the carelessness. nt

[Fumesucker]

38. I'd be shocked if it was actual carelessness and not deliberate, knowing policy

I think it will eventually be revealed that not putting direct alligator warning signs on the beach was a decision consciously reached after carefully weighing the pros and cons.. The pro would be not having guests occasionally eaten by alligators the con would be scaring off guests with alligator warning signs.

[BootinUp]

40. You and I rarely agree, lol.

[pnwmom]

42. I bet we never find out -- because Disney will quickly settle this. n/t

[jberryhill]

44. I'll bet the signs change.

[Fumesucker]

46. It takes two to settle

If that were my child no amount of money would keep me from finding out and publicizing to the world that Disney is no better than Ford with the Pinto exploding gas tanks.

[pnwmom]

49. That was the analogy I thought of too. This kind of decision happens. n/t

[Travis_0004]

57. The whole state of Florida has alligators

Its not like Disney shipped them there.

[Fumesucker]

58. And Disney has visitors from all over the world, many of whom know nothing of alligators

Disney is aware of both the presence of the alligators and the fact that many of their guests don't know anything about them.

[steve2470]

68. [phone] nt

[steve2470]

59. from my law school days, I remember the duty of businesses to customers

That means, a business has a duty to its customers to REASONABLY protect them from hazards such as slipping on the floor, being shocked by exposed electric wires, etc etc. Part of Walt Disney World's operating environment is wild animals such as alligators. Yes, it is impossible to 100% prevent people from doing careless things, but carefully worded warnings (in print and perhaps verbally by the front desk staff) and tasteful signs (can't scare the customers TOO much, you know) would go a long way towards preventing tragedies.

If there had been those warnings and tasteful signs, I am convinced this tragedy would have never happened. Saving one human life is worth forcing Disney to lose a small amount of business. It's really easy to avoid this tragedy. It's not like this would cripple their business. A few low-key warnings, some signs, everyone's happy.

[Adrahil]

90. And since this is the first fatality of that nature....

... I dont see how anyone can reasonably argue that they haven't taken reasinable precautions to protect guests.

[steve2470]

92. well, we disagree I guess

I think that's the end of this discussion. I think one human life is worth more than what they did. That's my position.

[JI7]

65. It's about what Disney presents itself as . people from around the world pick Disney

over other places because of what they think they are getting. especially when it comes to kids.

[tblue37]

82. Interesting.I also compared this to Ford's Pinto risk assessment choice. nt

[TeddyR]

69. But what would guests have been scared off from doing?

I've been to the beach where the child was killed, and to several others at the Disney resorts. The "no swimming" signs always meant don't go in the water to me. They didn't really mean "leave the resort because it is dangerous here." I've known that alligators were at Disney since the first time we visited because we've seen them in various locations, though I never viewed them as a threat. But the existence of gators didn't keep me from returning to Disney.

[Fumesucker]

80. Staying...

The guests would be in far more danger getting to and from Disney than they would be from alligators while there but people are not at all rational about assessing risks. You might recall the Ebola panic a while back, people even here on DU were going out of their minds with fear over it and then it got turned off like a switch when the media dropped it.

While we have been tippy tapping on our keyboards about this incident several young children will have died horribly in car crashes and no one but the people directly involved even know about it.

The familiar even if it is deadly just isn't particularly scary to us while the unfamiliar even if it's relatively safe can be terrifying.

[Nay]

89. Actually, I think guests pretty accurately assess the relative risks of, say, getting

into a car accident on the way to Disney vs. an alligator attack at Disney. We accept the risks of driving/flying/taking a train because there is literally no way to get anywhere otherwise, and such things as seat belts, safety regulations for roadways, cars, train tracks, etc., mitigate the risk and reduce it as much as humanly possible. The rest is left up to drivers, whom everyone accepts as fallible and prone to error. It's all fairly cut and dried and drivers accept the risk that a fatal accident can happen.

However, tourists from all over the world arriving at a resort with an inviting beach, chairs and tables by said beach, movie events held at said beach (at night when alligators feed!), cannot be expected to be aware of alligators in the lagoon next to their table, nor can they be expected to know alligator habits, nor can they prepare themselves for an alligator attack on a member of their family. They can ONLY keep themselves and their children entirely away from the shore, since there's really no way to get yourself or your child out of an alligator's grip. That's where Disney screwed up.

These attacks may not happen very often, but when they do they are horrific and mostly fatal. That lagoon had at least five alligators in it and Disney thought nothing of letting people and small children hang around on the shore? Even after a number of Canadian tourists reported that an alligator lunged at them and their children? No, no, no. At the very least there should have been specific signs telling parents to keep their children 50 feet away from the water because there were alligators present, and alligators like to eat small mammals. Unless you give people plain and specific information that allows them to assess risk, you can hardly blame them for not knowing the risk. A "no swimming" sign does NOT give people ANY information that allowed them to correctly assess the danger that was present in that lagoon.