Two Year Old Dragged Into Lagoon By Alligator At Disney Resort

a reply to: veracity

I do agree that it is dangerous. For a variety of reasons and not necessarily for those doing the feeding.

For one, as has been mentioned, it gets the alligator used to people. What's more, is it creates an association in the animal's mind of 'people=easy food.'

Is that something that should be encouraged?

This was a horrible accident that could have easily been prevented by a common sense approach to recreation in an area known to be a natural habitat for an extremely dangerous animal.

a reply to: luthier

Actually, piranha are far less problematic. They swim in and around them all the time in the Amazon. They'll take advantage of dead bodies, but they tend to avoid attacking large prey, even when they hold the advantage of numbers.

As far as the beach feature goes, maybe they thought they could build it as a traditional swimming beach until they realized they could not control the gator population reliably.

originally posted by: GuidedKill

originally posted by: luthier
a reply to: GuidedKill

Yeah I have travelled and hiked in many dangerous situations.

None of them poolside with a drink in my hand at a care free resort.

Even if I was an ecotourist in Costa Rica I would accept I am there to be in nature with the wild. These resorts attract those not exactly buying that adventure though and places like Disney are more than willing to sell it to them and then down play the environmental risk since there haven't been many incidents.

I am personally opposed to these types of resorts even existing to begin with. I think if you design in beautiful natural spots (especially wetlands) you should be required to design for as minimal impact to habitat as possible. Hey that's just me. That would certainly raise the incidents of people hanging out near the water getting eaten if it isn't treated as danger.

Bringing a people buffet to the waters edge seems like flirting with disaster when the design doesn't even require this. The water serves no function what so ever other than landscaping for the business.


They can do whatever they want with their property. I just think this design is asking for problems. I actually was indifferent until I saw it

Very valid point luthier, I agree with you on the poor design and location of Disney World however I think we both know why the location was selected.....Swamp land is and was real cheap to buy and develop. While I also agree with you that the water being near the hotel or lounge area is dumb idea as it is not a actual "swimming" area I still think personally it is not Walt Disney World or the parents fault. Many hotels, and other businesses are near water features here in FL. The natural topography makes it near impossible to not be near water in most of the State.

Just a terrible accident in and around a Alligators natural habitat. It's a shame I'm sure we can all agree on that.

It is a shame.

And yes an accident.

I just wish it would call into question whether having these resorts in areas like this even makes sense. Especially if they aren't better connected to the enviornment and their impact on it.

Florida is beautiful. I used to rent a place on Sanibel with some friends in the summer when I was younger.

The sad part is we have the design science to live with the wild better in these delicate swamps.

Make Disney out in the desert where the habitat is not nearly as diverse and delicate.

a reply to: ketsuko
Maybe they should have consulted a biologist who would surely have told them their design makes controlling the gators impossible.

a reply to: luthier

I won't disagree with you there if that was what they were thinking. I have no real idea what the design process on it all was.

originally posted by: luthier
a reply to: ketsuko
Maybe they should have consulted a biologist who would surely have told them their design makes controlling the gators impossible.

I used to be in resort development and design and worked with a guy who was a Imagineer for Disney. You would be floored how much design and engineering have gone into making Disney function in its current environment. Obviously they can't think of everything but they are far beyond what most hotels and ammusment companies are currently doing. The stories and ideas this guy had and worked on to overcome many problems was just mind boggling. Granted most of the ideas were centered around attraction and money making it is still pretty amazing what lengths they went to.

Like using Doppler radar as far back as the 70's to see where storms were developing so they could adjust seating in attractions to let people run un from the rain and have a spot to sit. Or like using live plucked chickens in cages in all attractions to see how many misquito bites they had and if they needed to spray for bugs. Or how they real time slightly adjust speed on certain rides to offset real wait times of customers etc.

a reply to: GuidedKill

Somewhere, I have an illegal backstage photo of Disneyworld. My kids' choir was afforded the honor of being the youngest kids group ever at that time to come and perform at Disneyworld. When we got there, they took us on a backstage tour. As our buses pulled up, I was taking pictures with my new camera. A tour guide got on board and told us all that if we got caught taking pictures of anything (including through bus windows), our cameras would be confiscated.

Later on, my parents couldn't figure out what those pictures were. I told them they were from the airport because I didn't want to get in trouble. I didn't actually reveal what they really were until years and years later.

They do just look like some forklifts and stuff.

The local news is saying that they were from here (Nebraska).

So I can tell you that gators weren't even on these parents mind. Sign or not, you just don't consider that one might actually pop up out of the water and take your child if you're from around here.

I mean, to me, thats only something that happens in movies.

Sadly, now I know better.
I hope everyone learned a little something about nature from this; she's a cruel b#*@!

Alligator mating season in Florida. They're a lot bolder during this time of year. In all fairness, if there's ANY chance of an alligator being in the waters of a tourist area, they really need some signs for that, not just No Swimming.... I mean, those signs are all over all of the lakes I've seen here.

Who the hell lets their 2 year old just play in murky lake water anyhow? I mean, I feel for them, and this tragic loss, but damn man....how do you let that happen?

That said, I'm sure that Disney will take care of the parents financially, fault or not, just out of good PR and self preservation. They always do. Though nothing can replace a lost child.

a reply to: Chickensalad

Have you heard yet where the family is from in Nebraska? I heard on Facebook they might be from Elkhorn, NE. I am in Lincoln and have been listening all day to the radio.

They have found the child's body, according to CNN

The 2-year-old boy who witnesses said was pulled by an alligator into a lagoon near a Walt Disney World hotel has been found dead, a source with knowledge of the investigation told CNN on Wednesday.

This is awful. God bless his little soul. And his parents. My God, the horror. It's too upsetting to even dwell on.

I hate this story, for lots of reasons.

Press conference going on now. They're saying they've found the child's body. They've also given his name, Lane Graves. They said the body was "intact."

I've said more than once before that Florida is America's Australia -- everything there wants to kill you. I wasn't joking before, and am not now. Anyone native or long-time resident knows damn well you do not approach inland water, even if it's a sectioned off area of a lake. Open water in the wild is a death wish, and sectioned off water is just a gamble, those nets don't always stop gators.

That being said, it's also not uncommon for them to make their way to the coasts, either. My sister-in-law literally tripped over a submerged one on a barrier island's mainland-facing beach in her youth (freaked her the F out for life) Odds are much, much lower of tangoing with a gator at a coastal/barrier island beach, but the risk is still present. They can and do venture into brackish & salt water.

But to dabble with an inland body of water is just stupid if you know better. I can't really fault a tourist who is in an area presumed safe. Wading is permitted at Disney's lagoon, so it was within the realm of safety expectations for them to do so. I can fault Disney for permitting access to the water, however. Trying to prevent a gator from getting into a body of water is like trying to hold water in a sieve -- not gonna happen. Disney should never have allowed wading access to the lagoon in the first place.

a reply to: Misterlondon

My cat died Monday night too

a reply to: Nyiah
And they have been known to climb the walls of a canal.

I had a baby in my pond after a hurricane. I called the wildlife people to come and get it. They told me to call them when it grew up. Luckily it moved on on its own, but I still see them every now and then bathing themselves along the canal banks.

My friend lives on a golf course and she still has lost several pets to the gators. Her's were pet ducks. But a few of her neighbors have lost pet dogs.

We forget that we are the intruders. We get to chose where we call home. The animals we displace don't have that luxury.

As some one that's been to WDW a few times now. The signs say no swimming and there are signs that say do not feed the wildlife anywhere near water and food. The water where they have these beaches are all not clean. You should see when a boat is out on the water, it's basically like a swamp, brown water everywhere. I wouldn't let a child go in that.

Check the location of the beach chairs and such, it's a fair distance from the water's edge. Bet the distance is the average distance an alligator can strike from in the places they can actually hide in those lakes and lagoons. They even go around and force people to bring them back to where they are supposed to be when they catch visitors and give a bit of an explanation, witnessed a cast member doing this last trip.

Why in the world are there alligators at Disney World in the first place?