Walt Disney World monorail system power outage strands riders for hours
News — By Sara K. Clarke on December 14, 2009 at 10:14 amBy Sara K. Clarke, Orlando Sentinel
Walt Disney World’s monorail system suffered a power failure Saturday night, stranding some passengers for hours before riders were rescued by emergency crews.
The monorail was brought to a standstill by a failed hard drive in the computer system that runs the 15-mile long transportation system. The monorail lost power to its beam.
No one was injured, said Bo Jones, of the Reedy Creek Fire Department, which serves the Walt Disney World resort.
The monorail was running again by the time parks opened Sunday.
About 300 people were affected by the incident, which happened at about 1 a.m. Many of Walt Disney World’s parks were already closed at the time, but the Magic Kingdom was open until 1 a.m.
Seven monorail trains were operating at the time. Three trains had passengers on them and were not at a station at the time of the power failure. Those passengers were either assisted by emergency responders from Reedy Creek Improvement District, or disembarked after their train was towed to a nearby station. Three other trains were already in the station at the time of the power failure, and one was empty.
Fire fighters did use fire ladders to rescue some park visitors, but Jones said the measure was for customer service, rather than for emergency purposes.
“Our commitment to safety guides all we do, and this is the type of situation we train for with Reedy Creek,” said Andrea Finger, spokeswoman for Walt Disney World. “We extend our apologies to guests who were affected and are working directly with them.”
Jones said the Reedy Creek fire department trains for such an incident about six to eight times a year.
“We’re ready for it when it happens and try to make it as speedy a process as we can,” he said.
This morning’s incident comes several months after monorail operator Austin Wuennenberg was killed in a collision between two trains. Wuennenberg was the first fatality in the history of the Walt Disney World monorail system.
In September, the park’s monorail system experienced an electrical short at a control booth that shut down some parts of the transportation system. About 25 guests were affected briefly in that incident, until a tractor
Tags: Disney World, monorail, transportation
Tweet This
Digg This
Save to delicious
Stumble it
Follow Dewayne on Twitter
20 Comments
How many more days are you going to write about Disney’s monorail? Between this and Tiger it is getting rather old!!
…..and so it goes~~
i THOUGHT TIGER WOODS WAS DRIVING THE MONORAIL, AND HE HIT A FIRE HYDRANT!!
A million comedians out of work and this guy thinks he is funny,,,,,,,,,,,,NOT
When I was single, no kids – eons ago – I used to get mad when things like this happened, irritated that they ‘ruined’ my vacation. Then along came the first kid and the light bulb went on: whenever anything goes wrong on a vacation its one of the most memorable things about that vacation. We’ve ingrained this philosophy into ourselves and our kids and we’ve had some pretty unusual things ‘go wrong’ on vacations that have become THE highlight of some of those trips. The people on the monorail system that night had an experience they’ll never forget and over time the bad parts will soften and the story will grow into legend within their families.
You obviously have never experienced being trapped 50 feet in the air in central florida with two toddlers worrying how to get them down a fire rescue ladder. And watching them terrified as fire fighters broke through the ceiling of the car. I think it will require years of therapy for some riders, not create a memorable experience. Two windows were cracked approximately two inches on either side of the cars. This was the only fresh air let on board for over 3 hours. No restrooms, no water supply and riders were told to absolutely not open the emergency exit windows. Riders called 911 and no one responded. If we were heading into the park and not out to our cars after park closing I’m sure things would have been taken care of a lot faster. The only car rescued was the one who was beating on the windows and making threats. Disney came through though. After a three hour wait, we were offered a free one day pass and a bottle of water. Fun times. If news crews had not shown up I am very confident we would have spent three more hours waiting on that train…and oh by the way we were about three hundred yards from the transportation and ticket center, not before the contemporary resort as information has been released by Disney. And it still took three hours to get a tow out? We were told there were two hundred and fifty people on our train alone. It’s amazing how stories get distorted to their advantage.
My sentiments exactly!! How many more days? It wasn’t hours, and how long did you think it would take? 10 minutes? And Why publish the crash articles and pictures Again?? What about his friends and family?
10 minutes? Didn’t you read hours? Have you ever had kids or a wife that have to go to the bathroom for a half hour? No air or lights at 1 am till nearly 3. Doesn’t sound like a “speedy process”. No backup for a hard drive? Sounds like this futuristic monorail needs serious redesign. Those passengers deserve the compensation that they will no doubt receive. Guest safety over manpower reduction. Sentinel writer: How’s that NTSB report coming on the accident? I’m anxious to read it.
Sick of these complainers to got hung up on the ride. If this would have happened in any other country they just would have went with it but not Americans , they want a free ride , money, tickets etc. No wonder everyone hates America
i’m sick of them blaming the computer for the failures. the hard drive would not cause this to happen. the program may cause a power failure but not the hard drive. if a hard drive failed then the back up system would go on. if there is no back up system then that is really really bad. Disney should have said we have no back up system and we had a hard drive failure. This is not a computer problem this was human error for failure to consider hard drives actually fail.
Monorail without power? Hum, better call Charlie, or better yet, “Pass the Word” that Jorge Lovenguth is the Independent candidate for the U.S. Senator office in the Florida 2010 Election. Jorge will get you some power to fix that monorail.
Maybe they want you to call CSX?
IS RON ANTI-AMERICAN? YOU DECIDE! RON, WE DON’T NEED YOU TO TRASH AMERICANS! IF YOU DON’T LIKE US, THEN GO TO IRAN, AND SEE HOW YOU LIKE IT THERE!
I AGREE WITH THE OTHER GUY–THAT MISTAKES ON VACATIONS CAN TURN INTO A FUN EVENT. IT HAPPENED TO US AT UNIVERSAL, WHEN THE SPIDERMAN RIDE WAS NEW AND STILL HAD SOME BUGS TO FIX. MEMORABLE AND HILLARIOUS! AND, NO–RON, WE DIDN’T ASK FOR ANY FREEBIES! LIKE I SAID TO YOU BEFORE–MAKE IRAN YOUR PERMANENT HOME!
To Just For the Record:
Amen! SEE YA RON! We need positive people in America! If you’re not with us, you’re against us! It sounds like you’re on your way to another place more to your liking–IF Iran will take you!
It had a power outage, big deal. This happens all across America every day. The only issue here is the wait time it took to get passengers out of the cars.
The incident itself is not a big issue, but can make a little difference for WDW at a time of busiest holidy season.
It happened again last night.Not a big issue! Tell that to the hundreds on the monorail that had to wait hours while they towed in another broken monorail.
If you’re going to report every time the monorail breaks down, perhaps you should just camp out at the TTC. Just like the rides, something happens to the monorail every week. Take into consideration that monorails are, at least, 15 yrs old. The entire system runs almost 20 hrs a day 7 days a week. At different parts of the year, the system operates 24hrs a day, for several days a year.
If people want a “safer, more efficient” monorail, then perhaps park hours should be reduced to allow for proper maintenance. But, that would reduce revenue and increase cost. Not exactly the Disney way.
While I do agree something like that happening will be remembered for years, I think Disney should compensate all those aboard. Regardless of their operating hours the average cost for a family of four to go to disney for a week is anywhere from 3 to 5 thousand dollars. You can bet I fully expect everything to work and operate the way it should EVERY TIME. I have 2 young children who would have been terrified to be evacuated through the roof of the monorail and then be carried down a ladder. I can say that would have been the last ride we went on.
nike air max shoes and nike dunk shoes
http://www.tradertrade.com