Skip to content

guest safety

Disneyland Small World Fire Aftermath

iasw-disneyland

Last week a small portion of It’s A Small World’s beautiful facade was charred by an off-stage fire caused when fireworks malfunctioned and lit a tree and construction tarp on fire.

If you missed the video you can see it here

It’s A Small World caught on fire #Disney #smallworld #disneyland

A video posted by Mundo (@mundocious) on

It’s a small world’s facade has been under renovation, which is periodically required to keep the complicated structure looking show ready (especially with all the abuse it takes each Christmas season). Here is a show of the construction taken on February 6th, a few weeks before the fire.

iasw-disneyland-prior1

That there is the occasional fire from Fireworks fallout is to be expected. Consider how many shells Disney launches each night and then multiply that by a year’s worth of fireworks shows. A small fire or two is bound to happen.

By all accounts Disney cast members acted swiftly and correctly that night. Guests were evacuated from the danger zone and the firefighters who are on hand every night for the fireworks display had the fire extinguished in less than 20 minutes.

In the photos below you can see that some of the trees took a minor beating in the fire and that some of the gold spires are now charred by the fire.Read More »Disneyland Small World Fire Aftermath

Disneyland Measles Outbreak Spreads to Cast Members

It’s like the B-movie villain that just won’t die, Disneyland just can’t escape the clutches of the Measles outbreak. It started in late December when a guest who carried the disease visited the park. Since then, dozens of cases have popped up tied to that… Read More »Disneyland Measles Outbreak Spreads to Cast Members

Construction Fire at Magic Kingdom Plaza Improvement Project

fire-plaza-magic-kingdom

I had a few free moments this afternoon and my son and I decided to visit the Magic Kingdom to sneak in a few rides and see Seven Dwarfs Mine Train with all the walls finally removed. More on that later this weekend. As we were headed out of Tomorrowland toward the hub, just about 3pm, we saw a small puff of smoke and then fire quickly growing around a generator / water pump near the edge of the Magic Kingdom Plaza Improvement project construction zone (read my recent update of that construction).

In a few moments, it had burnt through most of the fencing directly adjacent to it and looked to be threatening the fern bushes between it and Tomorrowland Terrace. Guests were dining just a few feet away in the restaurant, but quickly took notice of the flames, some moving away, some coming over for a closer look.

I felt that on the Tomorrowland Bridge, I was a safe distance away. I took out my camera and my mobile phone to get some video. It’s hard to film both at the same time and upload to Instagram, so I handed the camera off to a poorly trained monkey nearby. The first part of the video is the footage I could save from his unfocused attempts at documenting the incident.

From when we arrived to when the fire was extinguished took almost exactly 5 minutes.

As it turns out, there was one worker in the construction zone. After standing a few paces away and thinking about the best course of action, he left the scene, traveled under the bridge to the other side of main street, then returned with a bucket full of water. Which did almost nothing to put out the flames. Luckily there was a closer source of water, so he took a few steps down the bank and refilled the bucket then dumped it on the flames again, still with little impact on the fire itself. But I think he did prevent it from spreading any further.Read More »Construction Fire at Magic Kingdom Plaza Improvement Project

Disneyland Cast Member Actually Exploded Dry-Ice Twice

The former (I assume) Disneyland Outdoor Vending Cast Member was arraigned for the Toontown blast today. He pled not guilty. As part of the proceedings we learned a bit more about the events of the day, including a surprising revelation – there was a second… Read More »Disneyland Cast Member Actually Exploded Dry-Ice Twice