Can't believe what I saw on BTM

[maj42169]

During our Thanksgiving trip, we witnessed a group of boys sporting a respectable private school letter jackets on the BTMR ride. These boys pretended to have their lap bars clasped, even acted like they were trying to lift up the bars as the workers went past to check. But, then once we started out onto the track these three rows of boys all started to stand up on the. Ride. They pretended the lap bars were closed but really were planning to try and stand the entire ride. One of them even climbed up and was standing on the seat. I was scared to death that these kids were going to get severely injured or worse. One boy was standing up trying to pull the bats off as we. Went through the cave. He nearly go this head knocked on the bones as we went by. I kept yelling at them to sit down, they didn't seem to care or listen. When the ride was over the happened to be a security man waiting where we exited the seats. I approached both the worker and security am. And told them what had happened. Their response to me was, and I quote, "that is not what he is here for!"

I went to the main hall to file an official complaint. They didn't seem the least bit interested I. What I had to report. Now, I know they have cameras on all of the rides. It would have been easy for the to check out what I was saying. It was pretty much brushed off, and I was never contacted in any way from the company.

I was stunned. I can't even believe with all the technology today that the train would even be able to go out onto the track if there were seats not secured. If that is the case, the workers need to by physically pulling every single bar themselves!

Surely Disney should have taken that seriously. I took it seriously enough to contact the school that those boys were representing! They happened to be on a school trip. Thankfully, their headmaster took it seriously enough to actually contact me back! Too bad Disney didn't seem to care that there could have been a serious accident that evening, and probably potential lawsuits.

 

[White_Sox_Fan]

My daughter's school went on a spring break trip to perform at Disney. While there one student decided to walk from car to car across the top of the TTA. Security was there to meet him when he got off and he was thrown out of the park. Had one of his parents not been a chaperone he would have been taken to the airport to fly back at his expense. As it was he and his mother had to stay at the hotel for the remainder of the trip.

 

[supergoofy]

I thank you for bringing this to Disney's attention

I don't understand why Disney didn't take action. I find it odd as if somebody got hurt I know Disney would be looking at a lawsuit and win or lose very bad press.

 

[maj42169]

The headmaster of the school made all six boys write me letters of apology. I didn't want to get them in trouble. I only wanted them to see the severity of their actions! I still can't believe that Disney didn't even look into it at all.

 

[Turn the Page]

I guess I'm really not sure why you are so upset about this. You did everything you could by reporting the matter to security why pursue it beyond that? I'm not sure you can blame Disney employees for the incident, though they really should have physically checked all the lap bars. At some point personal responsibility comes into play and if the boys were in old enough to be in high school they are old enough to know better and if they had gotten hurt it would've been no ones fault but their own.

Also, you seem amazed that students of a "respectable private school" would behave in such an irresponsible manner. Why is that? Have you never heard that sometimes kids from upper class families that attend the best private schools can be holy terrors? It's not that surprising.


ETA: If you called the headmaster at their "very respectable private school" what did you expect would happen? A PSA that standing up on a roller coaster is not a good idea?

 

[maj42169]

I guess I'm really not sure why you are so upset about this. You did everything you could by reporting the matter to security why pursue it beyond that? I'm not sure you can blame Disney employees for the incident, though they really should have physically checked all the lap bars. At some point personal responsibility comes into play and if the boys were in old enough to be in high school they are old enough to know better and if they had gotten hurt it would've been no ones fault but their own.

Also, you seem amazed that students of a "respectable private school" would behave in such an irresponsible manner. Why is that? Have you never heard that sometimes kids from upper class families that attend the best private schools can be holy terrors? It's not that surprising.

I know full well that kids from upper class families can be terrors. I went to a private school myself. I'm saying that I was able to find their school online by the jackets they wore which were from a private school in Georgia.

It upset me so much because my daughter is still traumatized by it. She kept screaming and thought one of the boys were going. To fly out of the seat and knock her off the ride. I don't care about what happened to those boys after they got back to school. I DO care that my daughter witnessed this and still has dreams about it.

AND, I care that Disney management and security didn't seem bothered by the fact that the safety of everyone on that train was compromised by the actions of those kids. I'm saying, that the workers need to be made to physically check each bar if it is that easy to just pretend the lap bars are latched.

 

[newdeal]

its pretty shocking that they don't have cameras on the ride monitoring it or some type of system to let them know if a lap bar has been released. Or maybe they do and they just knew if they stopped the ride the kids would be thrown off at a very high rate of speed

 

[Turn the Page]

I know full well that kids from upper class families can be terrors. I went to a private school myself. I'm saying that I was able to find their school online by the jackets they wore which were from a private school in Georgia.

It upset me so much because my daughter is still traumatized by it. She kept screaming and thought one of the boys were going. To fly out of the seat and knock her off the ride. I don't care about what happened to those boys after they got back to school. I DO care that my daughter witnessed this and still has dreams about it.

Then perhaps counseling would be in order to help your daughter cope with it rather than running all over WDW and conducting an internet search to track down someone else to complain to. How exactly is tattling to the principal going to help your daughter cope with it?

 

[Turn the Page]

its pretty shocking that they don't have cameras on the ride monitoring it or some type of system to let them know if a lap bar has been released. Or maybe they do and they just knew if they stopped the ride the kids would be thrown off at a very high rate of speed

I thought they did. Wasn't there a video of BTMRR or the Matterhorn circulating on here awhile back with a similar incident and they stopped the ride and told the boys to sit down?

 

[maj42169]

its pretty shocking that they don't have cameras on the ride monitoring it or some type of system to let them know if a lap bar has been released. Or maybe they do and they just knew if they stopped the ride the kids would be thrown off at a very high rate of speed

My thing is that the train shouldn't be able to leave the loading area with bars not latched! That would eliminate the problem all together!

 

[maj42169]

Then perhaps counseling would be in order to help your daughter cope with it rather than running all over WDW and conducting an internet search to track down someone else to complain to. How exactly is tattling to the principal going to help your daughter cope with it?

You handle the situation the way YOU feel necessary, and I handled it the way I Felt necessary! You were not there, and I didn't get into a long post about what all else went on from those boys toward my family after the ride was over. That isn't what this post is about. It was about the SAFETY of the ride. I'm not interested in your opinion on how I handled the situation. I'm interested in your comments on how Disney handled it, or what can be done for future safety. Now, if there were videos of similar incidents on other Disney rides circulating on YouTube, then there is a bigger problem, and they are lucky that people haven't been hurt or killed.

 

[DRDISNEYMD]

During our Thanksgiving trip, we witnessed a group of boys sporting a respectable private school letter jackets on the BTMR ride. These boys pretended to have their lap bars clasped, even acted like they were trying to lift up the bars as the workers went past to check. But, then once we started out onto the track these three rows of boys all started to stand up on the. Ride. They pretended the lap bars were closed but really were planning to try and stand the entire ride. One of them even climbed up and was standing on the seat. I was scared to death that these kids were going to get severely injured or worse. One boy was standing up trying to pull the bats off as we. Went through the cave. He nearly go this head knocked on the bones as we went by. I kept yelling at them to sit down, they didn't seem to care or listen. When the ride was over the happened to be a security man waiting where we exited the seats. I approached both the worker and security am. And told them what had happened. Their response to me was, and I quote, "that is not what he is here for!"

I went to the main hall to file an official complaint. They didn't seem the least bit interested I. What I had to report. Now, I know they have cameras on all of the rides. It would have been easy for the to check out what I was saying. It was pretty much brushed off, and I was never contacted in any way from the company.

I was stunned. I can't even believe with all the technology today that the train would even be able to go out onto the track if there were seats not secured. If that is the case, the workers need to by physically pulling every single bar themselves!

Surely Disney should have taken that seriously. I took it seriously enough to contact the school that those boys were representing! They happened to be on a school trip. Thankfully, their headmaster took it seriously enough to actually contact me back! Too bad Disney didn't seem to care that there could have been a serious accident that evening, and probably potential lawsuits.

~Ugh..... Sorry, you and your daughter had to experience that. It's funny because the "respectable" private school letter jackets would have been red flags & sent me running for the hills. Seriously, everyone knows they're the worst ones because this group can get away with almost anything. Sad, but true.

~I really don't get Disney's dry response -- other than it must not be a big deal or they had several other serious matters to handle. It seems like you wasted a lot of time and energy on this -- I may have told the CM what happened and to make sure to check the bars next time and move on.

 

[waltfan42]

I'm actually shocked at how Disney handled this. I think contacting the school was absolutely the right thing to do. Most people would have been too lazy or apathetic to bother. Teenagers can be impulsive and do things that can get them killed. Hopefully due to your actions, these boys will think twice before they do something similar again with a much more tragic outcome.

 

[lustergirl]

I guess I'm really not sure why you are so upset about this. You did everything you could by reporting the matter to security why pursue it beyond that? I'm not sure you can blame Disney employees for the incident, though they really should have physically checked all the lap bars. At some point personal responsibility comes into play and if the boys were in old enough to be in high school they are old enough to know better and if they had gotten hurt it would've been no ones fault but their own.

Also, you seem amazed that students of a "respectable private school" would behave in such an irresponsible manner. Why is that? Have you never heard that sometimes kids from upper class families that attend the best private schools can be holy terrors? It's not that surprising.


ETA: If you called the headmaster at their "very respectable private school" what did you expect would happen? A PSA that standing up on a roller coaster is not a good idea?

Have to agree with this post. Sorry OP but I think your daughter will survive such an "traumatic experience". Me personally, if it wasn't one of my own kids acting up I wouldn't bother reporting them to their school. I would just be happy that one of the pranksters didn't get hurt.

 

[Turn the Page]

You handle the situation the way YOU feel necessary, and I handled it the way I Felt necessary! You were not there, and I didn't get into a long post about what all else went on from those boys toward my family after the ride was over. That isn't what this post is about. It was about the SAFETY of the ride. I'm not interested in your opinion on how I handled the situation. I'm interested in your comments on how Disney handled it, or what can be done for future safety. Now, if there were videos of similar incidents on other Disney rides circulating on YouTube, then there is a bigger problem, and they are lucky that people haven't been hurt or killed.

Ok, you want my opinion about how Disney handled the situation? From what I understand there are cameras everywhere in Disney World. Eve. ry. where. Which means they knew about what happened already and I'm guessing they just didn't feel the need to explain to you how they handled the situation. There are also videos online of some kids doing the same thing on Tower of Terror and the ride was stopped and they were ordered to put their restraints on. Why that didn't happen in this case I can't presume to say.

But if this incident happened at Thanksgiving and you're so upset about it four months later to post it on here perhaps you should seek other ways to deal with it because clearly what you are doing is not working either you, or your daughter, to cope with the situation.

If you are uncomfortable with the safety of the rides then perhaps you shouldn't go on them anymore. They are required to meet state safety standards so perhaps a letter to your congressmen requesting more stringent safety standards would be a good thing to do.

 

[rastuso]

I'm actually shocked at how Disney handled this. I think contacting the school was absolutely the right thing to do. Most people would have been too lazy or apathetic to bother. Teenagers can be impulsive and do things that can get them killed. Hopefully due to your actions, these boys will think twice before they do something similar again with a much more tragic outcome.

I was once on Splash, and a kid was standing up. They immediately yelled at him, and at one place, they stopped his log, and yanked him out.

Heck, I was getting fresh with my wife in the HM, and almost immediately got yelled at! Can't believe they didn't shut doesn't the ride when this happened. Perhaps their security cam watcher needs to be relieved of duties.

Jason

 

[maj42169]

I'm actually shocked at how Disney handled this. I think contacting the school was absolutely the right thing to do. Most people would have been too lazy or apathetic to bother. Teenagers can be impulsive and do things that can get them killed. Hopefully due to your actions, these boys will think twice before they do something similar again with a much more tragic outcome.

Thank you. That is my hope. We all know teenagers think they are invincible, and many times don't think about the consequences of their actions. If even one of these boys thinks twice next time before doing something so dangerous, then my efforts were worth it.

 

[DRDISNEYMD]

The headmaster of the school made all six boys write me letters of apology. I didn't want to get them in trouble. I only wanted them to see the severity of their actions! I still can't believe that Disney didn't even look into it at all.

~This is interesting. I think the school should have written the letter and I totally blame the school. Teens need to be chaperoned at all times, it's been like this from the beginning of time. This is Juvenile Delinquency 101.

I know full well that kids from upper class families can be terrors. I went to a private school myself. I'm saying that I was able to find their school online by the jackets they wore which were from a private school in Georgia.

It upset me so much because my daughter is still traumatized by it. She kept screaming and thought one of the boys were going. To fly out of the seat and knock her off the ride. I don't care about what happened to those boys after they got back to school. I DO care that my daughter witnessed this and still has dreams about it.

AND, I care that Disney management and security didn't seem bothered by the fact that the safety of everyone on that train was compromised by the actions of those kids. I'm saying, that the workers need to be made to physically check each bar if it is that easy to just pretend the lap bars are latched.

~I hope your daughter feels better and can put the incident behind her.

 

[maj42169]

Ok, you want my opinion about how Disney handled the situation? From what I understand there are cameras everywhere in Disney World. Eve. ry. where. Which means they knew about what happened already and I'm guessing they just didn't feel the need to explain to you how they handled the situation. There are also videos online of some kids doing the same thing on Tower of Terror and the ride was stopped and they were ordered to put their restraints on. Why that didn't happen in this case I can't presume to say.

But if this incident happened at Thanksgiving and you're so upset about it four months later to post it on here perhaps you should seek other ways to deal with it because clearly what you are doing is not working either you, or your daughter, to cope with the situation.

If you are uncomfortable with the safety of the rides then perhaps you shouldn't go on them anymore. They are required to meet state safety standards so perhaps a letter to your congressmen requesting more stringent safety standards would be a good thing to do.

I really don't get your gripe with me, or why I was so bothered by the actions of those kids.

 

[mousehockey37]

It is rather interesting that Disney didn't do much, to your knowledge. Especially when they get to the point of potentially having a deadly accident with pending lawsuits. However, should something had happened, your account of what occurred would definitely have showed that yes, Disney did what they needed to do to prevent the accident from occurring, and that unfortunately, the deception on the behalf of the kids is what would have caused their demise.

Luckily, nothing happened. I'm sorry your daughter still has nightmares about this. This may be something that she may not recover from, even with all the counseling in the world, aka that was the last time the 2 of you probably will have ridden BTMRR.

Moving forward, you know the drill as to speaking with companies. If you speak with the associates and they don't help, you move to the next level. You did this, unfortunately town hall was no help either. Had you were to possess video footage of the ride showing the behavior of this to the company, they definitely would have someone in contact with you to secure the footage for their use, more than likely.

As for the contacting of the school. I don't consider it tattling. I was a teacher myself. If students are wrong, they need to suffer the consequences of their actions, and the school needs to be notified. As another poster stated, kid did something stupid, got kicked out, and wasn't allowed back in. In the case of this being a school trip, they are representing not only themselves, but the school, community and area they come from (this is how stereotypes evolved) and most want nothing but the best.

You did nothing wrong with any step of what you did. The fact that the headmaster had them write you letters of apology is probably only 1 visible thing that they allowed you to see. There were probably more actions taken by the school that you were not let in on, aka, these kids are probably not going on any more trips anytime soon, no matter how much money they throw at it.

Once again, you did what was right by your standards. Other posters are also right though, in that personal responsibility does come into play, but I throw out this notion... On a high school trip, in Disney World, most times chaperones are not used for groups. Once the kids are in the park, they are to stay in groups (of students) and they can do as they please. This is a textbook example of that. What am I getting at? Probably not one of them was 18 years old, the technical age of being able to make decisions for ones self, so is a chaperone needed to assume that "personal responsibility" for those 6 boys? Apparently in this specific example... yes.