Inclement Weather

[NYEmomma]

We're very much a make-the-best-of-it family and plan on going with the flow and making the best of if, but my anxiety makes me plan for the worst and hope for the best.

We're arriving tomorrow and our first park day is Saturday. This is my first experience with tropical weather as I've never been anywhere on the coast during summer but I understand that things continuously change. As of this very second, it looks like heavy rain much of Saturday.

We're scheduled to go to Typhoon Lagoon. I'd be more than willing to change up the plans and do a park that day (Epcot or HS maybe where we'd be inside more) but with having to make park reservations in the past, I have no ability to change things up, correct?

If Typhoon Lagoon is unable to open that do, am I stuck just eating the cost of the tickets? We're not local so we can't just use them another time.

I'm used to the quick, daily mid-afternoon storm and have never had to think of weather outside of that until now.

 

[nalacat]

Following as we are also arriving tomorrow...heading to AK on Saturday, MK on Sunday and then to the beach for the rest of the week. Ironically, we were at WDW during TS Colin 6 years ago and only about 12 hours were a total washout...we were also at AK that day and the torrential downpours made it a very short/not the best day. Unfortunately, I am kind of expecting the same this time around, but really bummed since we only have 2 park days. I considered just not doing a park on Saturday and changing AK to Monday and then heading to the beach, but there is no AK park reservation availability on Monday. Looking for others to chime in!

 

[titojackson84]

I went a few years ago and the first day poured just about the whole day so we went to epcot. The only thing we couldn’t do was test track since part of it runs outdoors. There wasn’t anything else we couldn’t do. I’m also a fan of water parks on rainy days because I’m going to be wet anyways, as long as there isn’t lightning.

 

[Stratman50th]

I keep getting alerts on my phone and it looks like a nothing burger as far as wind and 1"-2" of rain, maybe. The track hasn't settled down yet but probably most of the rain south of us. I'm actually to the west and a little south of the parks. TL might get rain, but they probably won't close. Maybe you can switch to a park and do TL later? Hang in there, they don't have a clue where it's going to cross yet. There might e nothing at all in the Disney area.

 

[NYEmomma]

I keep getting alerts on my phone and it looks like a nothing burger as far as wind and 1"-2" of rain, maybe. The track hasn't settled down yet but probably most of the rain south of us. I'm actually to the west and a little south of the parks. TL might get rain, but they probably won't close. Maybe you can switch to a park and do TL later? Hang in there, they don't have a clue where it's going to cross yet. There might e nothing at all in the Disney area.

What is the best place to get the most up to date, accurate forecast? I feel like sites like the Weather Channel don't do as well as local weather stations.

 

[Stratman50th]

What is the best place to get the most up to date, accurate forecast? I feel like sites like the Weather Channel don't do as well as local weather stations.

I like Fox 13 Skytower radar (app). It's been the best app for radar that I've found. They're out of Tampa.
Here's a screens hot of the projected track
.

 

[DanaCeppy]

What is the best place to get the most up to date, accurate forecast? I feel like sites like the Weather Channel don't do as well as local weather stations.

As of today this is the forecast from one of the meteorologists I follow out of Tampa. I live north of Tampa so I follow this guy and another one named Denis Phillips. They are pretty much on the same page as far as this forecast

 

[DanaCeppy]

What is the best place to get the most up to date, accurate forecast? I feel like sites like the Weather Channel don't do as well as local weather stations.

Also don’t listen to the weather channel. They always hype everything up and make it sound worse then it is. They are ridiculous.

 

[kendie_mac]

To answer a couple of your questions—

Yes, you can change your park reservation. As of now AK & Epcot both have Saturday availability. You need an open ticket, so either add day to your tickets or cancel another park reservation first.

If you end up not using your Typhoon Lagoon tickets that day, go to Guest Services. They should be able to change the date on the ticket for you.

 

[Narcoossee11]

Sad for tourist, GREAT for our grass and trees.
It will be a wet weekend, but you will not melt

 

[Mr. Drauer]

don't believe the hype - this isn't anything to change your plans over unless your plans take you into south florida. It might rain some, it might not.

 

[Kanga and Roo]

The weather forecast for our trip in March on Weather.com was fabulous, the reality was different. Today here it was meant to be cloudy with thunderstorms, but, it's glorious sunshine. I do find the Wesh 2 weather forecast to always be the most accurate, so look on their website to see what it is forecast.
We didn't mind the rain when it happened,we are the ones who stay in the parks and enjoy everyone else running for cover and if you are lucky they may do the rainy day parade.

 

[_19disnA]

Also don’t listen to the weather channel. They always hype everything up and make it sound worse then it is. They are ridiculous.

I agree, they used to be much better at forecasting the weather and now it has turned into a talk show. Every weather event is NOT going to become some sort of major disaster. I think they try to hype everything up to get more people to watch for hours on end. After about 5 minutes of watching their forecast, you can move on to something else. Their live on location weather scenes typically pick the worst possible location and make it sound like an entire city is underwater, which is almost never the case.

Even with major hurricanes it doesn't seem like anyone can accurately predict the storm track more then 2-3 days ahead. Coastal areas that tend to be very sandy can easily handle several inches of rain and it isn't the end of the world every time it rains.

 

[Marthasor]

We use the Accuweather Minutecast - it's been pretty spot on for us.

 

[Stratman50th]

So to @NYEmomma, how did it go? We got nothing but a little rain so I'm guessing you really did ok? Plus sunny with blue skies on Sunday.

 

[jlstwinmommy]

Not NYEmomma, but we were there on Saturday. The weather was beautiful. We got a bit of a rain shower in the morning (thank goodness I brought old ponchos from a previous trip), but it only lasted about an hour at most. The afternoon was lovely. Sunshine and much cooler temps. We were at MK all day.

 

[Stratman50th]

Not NYEmomma, but we were there on Saturday. The weather was beautiful. We got a bit of a rain shower in the morning (thank goodness I brought old ponchos from a previous trip), but it only lasted about an hour at most. The afternoon was lovely. Sunshine and much cooler temps. We were at MK all day.

Good for you. You were lucky that the line was south of us. Looked like South Florida got smashed with rain. We really needed that rain here but didn't get it. Maybe next time.

 

[momto28weeker+1]

We went during a very busy week in April. One day everyone was feeling under the weather and we missed our HS reservations. We needed the rest. I went to the desk at the resort and they were able to get us reservations later in the week and every park was booked. You should be ok and the resort front desk was able to get us a reservation.

 

[bp2412]

Happy to hear it wasn't as bad for those in the parks.

A little off topic but we went on our trip back in March, I think it was the 5th-12th, and we're at Epcot on Monday. Great day all day. At around 7:30 we got some fish and chips and sat in UK and relaxed and happened to get one of those tables with a large umbrella. All of a sudden it starts to rain probably some of the heaviest rain I have ever seen in person. We sat covered and just watched people running and was pretty assumed for a bit while we waited we out. It did not want to ease up though, and after finally 2 hours it started to slow down to a drizzle so we decided to finally move it and then we realized why we heard so many people scream- the drainage couldn't keep up with the rain. Massive puddles everywhere, some sections were around 1/3 up our shins, completely soaking our shoes. Most people were actually laughing and making the best of it cause these puddles were nuts. Thankfully I had 2 pairs of shoes packed that trip and these were an old pair of gym shoes so they just went into the garbage the next day after trying to dry them out. Now it's funny thinking of that trip and that storm, happy it happened at the very end of the day though.