With Hurricane Irma's latest track, will staying at Disney be safe?

TFolks PLEASE remember the staff that is working while you are riding this out. It is not easy for them and there are many guests that don't remember or care about what the hotel staff is going through during times like this.

I was there too, staying at the Poly. We actually had a great time. They took such good care of us.
If you're at a bar or restaurant during this time, tipping 50%-100% would not be a bad idea.
 
I just left my Disney trip a day early only because I wanted to beat the traffic of people evacuating. If I lived in south Florida and had reservations at Disney already I would go there since I know quite a few people who live I south fl near the coast who are headed to Orlando.
 
This is the time that I would say a deluxe like WL and AKL (ones with no outer buildings) is truly worth staying at:) Would rather have the option of going down to the lobby where they will have activities going on for the kids.
 
I would really like some honest opinions please. We are booked at AofA beginning this Friday and are wondering if it will be safe in the path of the storm? We are driving up from Palm Beach County, so we are hoping Disney is a better alternative to where we actually live.

Is anyone else concerned about staying at Disney during the storm? Please... I really need reassurance and honest opinions.

Thanks so much.
We live in the middle of Polk county. We are leaving for Saratoga Springs Resort this Friday. We will prepare the house the best we can, but we don't have a generator and for medical reasons my husband has to have ac, CPAP,etc. We seem to have frequent power failures here. I know there's no guarantee WDW won't lose power but I have more faith in them than staying home!
 
We were there last year during Matthew. We decided to ride it out at the resort because we didn't want to join the people trying to evacuate. It was a good choice as the storm traveled up the coast and we would have been running from it the whole way home. We were told they would let us know if we had to stay in our rooms. We were able to walk around in the resort so it helped with the cooped up feeling. They had activities for the kids in the lobby (BC) and we were lucky that the restaurants were opened. We were staying CL and the lounge was open and food was served as usual. They did warn us that housekeeping would only be bringing towel, etc no cleaning but that was fine, Hallways got a little crowded with plates & glassware but nothing outrageous under the circumstances. Most people had a great attitude and we felt safe the entire time. This from a couple of northerners who are more used to 3-4ft snow storms.
 
I would really like some honest opinions please. We are booked at AofA beginning this Friday and are wondering if it will be safe in the path of the storm? We are driving up from Palm Beach County, so we are hoping Disney is a better alternative to where we actually live.

Is anyone else concerned about staying at Disney during the storm? Please... I really need reassurance and honest opinions.

Thanks so much.

I wouldn't bat an eye at staying at Disney if I could drive there safely. It is built very safe, even the Tree of Life is built to hurricane wind safety. Disney does it's best to take very good care of it's guests, something you won't get a lot of other places.

Have friends and family in S FL that evacuated to Disney every time a storm came in. If you have a room secured, I would absolutely head there as soon as you can on Friday. There will be likely folks trying to pick up rooms so I would get there early to check in, you can always do something else if room isn't ready.

I would also transport as much non-perishable food, water etc as you can.
 
Disney just posted on twitter

DJEerCpXoAAFl9K.jpg:large
 
If you're at a bar or restaurant during this time, tipping 50%-100% would not be a bad idea.

Absolutely! This is great advice. When Sandy hit, the kids and I stayed with my parents since dh had to work. Not service industry but above ground railroad. He worked 24 hours straight securing things and moving things to higher ground. He also assisted in moving people. Neither of us had power but I felt better not being alone with the kids. Dh worked 12 hour shifts the rest of the week. He would have rather been home, believe me. I would get so irate at people complaining about the train not working and how long it took. Guys who lost homes were forced to work. Just terrible. People complained nom stop, it was a natural disaster! People died and lost everything. Sorry, just a pet peeve of mine.
 
Our alternative is to cancel our reservation and stay home (Palm Beach County, 9 miles inland from the ocean). I've lived in this house 38 years and been through them all... Andrews, Wilma, Jeanne, Frances but I just really don't want to go through any more of them.

Just curious, why are are these your only 2 alternatives, home or Disney? Why not just keep driving north and leave FL altogether for a few days?
 
This is the time that I would say a deluxe like WL and AKL (ones with no outer buildings) is truly worth staying at:) Would rather have the option of going down to the lobby where they will have activities going on for the kids.
I remember last year that this was some great advice during Matthew, if one can afford it. But I will add that Kidani does have that underground parking, right? That might protect some guest cars.
 
First of all, thank you everyone! Sharing our concerns here has certainly helped :)

We live in the middle of Polk county. We are leaving for Saratoga Springs Resort this Friday. We will prepare the house the best we can, but we don't have a generator and for medical reasons my husband has to have ac, CPAP,etc. We seem to have frequent power failures here. I know there's no guarantee WDW won't lose power but I have more faith in them than staying home!
Linda, this is our situation as well in terms of hubby needing electricity for a cPap, etc.
Just curious, why are are these your only 2 alternatives, home or Disney? Why not just keep driving north and leave FL altogether for a few days?
In theory, driving further north sounds like a good idea, doesn't it? However, it's not. In fact, it's not a very good idea at all for people who live as far south as we do. By Florida being a peninsula, every.single.person only has one way out.. straight north. Once you hit the highways (there are really only 2 major roadways... the turnpike and I95), you risk getting stuck just sitting there. Then what do you do? You could lose your life by just sitting there. Also, there were no available hotel rooms further north (I've been ck'ing). Also, the further away you go, the more difficult it is to return. No gas, congested traffic, no electricity, downed trees, flooding, etc.

This was I95 yesterday, around Daytona Beach.
rGoebOO.jpg
 
First of all, thank you everyone! Sharing our concerns here has certainly helped :)


Linda, this is our situation as well in terms of hubby needing electricity for a cPap, etc.

In theory, driving further north sounds like a good idea, doesn't it? However, it's not. In fact, it's not a very good idea at all for people who live as far south as we do. By Florida being a peninsula, every.single.person only has one way out.. straight north. Once you hit the highways (there are really only 2 major roadways... the turnpike and I95), you risk getting stuck just sitting there. Then what do you do? You could lose your life by just sitting there. Also, there were no available hotel rooms further north (I've been ck'ing). Also, the further away you go, the more difficult it is to return. No gas, congested traffic, no electricity, downed trees, flooding, etc.

This was I95 yesterday, around Daytona Beach.
rGoebOO.jpg

Wow, understood. Thanks for the explanation and best wishes.
 
Thanks Ziggie. I just saw a back and forth on another website where someone just didn't get it - that everyone evacuating and evacuating as far as they can go could result in traffic backups that leave too many people who really do have to evacuate being stuck in traffic still in harm's way.
 
I would really like some honest opinions please. We are booked at AofA beginning this Friday and are wondering if it will be safe in the path of the storm? We are driving up from Palm Beach County, so we are hoping Disney is a better alternative to where we actually live.

Is anyone else concerned about staying at Disney during the storm? Please... I really need reassurance and honest opinions.

Thanks so much.

we were in a hurricane at WDW.....i think it was in 1995....the parks were closed...
i was there with my two young children...DH wasn't with us that year (he couldn't leave work)..

so we were at the all star music....disney was fantastic....
they kept us up to date with what was happening...
it was really interesting to see all the activity leading up to the hurricane as they completely cleared everything away...
they didn't tie stuff down, they actually removed everything....all the lounge chairs etc..

anyway, those buildings are built for powerful storms....
the hurricane hit during the night and i felt very safe in our room together with my two kids...
i never had a feeling that the building wouldn't hold up..

the only guests who were moved were the ones staying in fort wilderness, who i think were moved over to the all star sport, but i'm not sure....i know they were moved since the campgrounds are very unsafe..

but the resorts are built for hurricanes..

if it were me, i'd rather be at WDW, than nearer to the coast in palm beach...

.
 
Go to Disney.

Bring a couple of cases of water, non perishable food, flashlights and batteries, backup batteries for an electrical devices, books, and a pack of cards. In other words, your typical emergency supplies of anything you might need if you have to stay in your room for a day or so without power.

I wouldn't entirely depend on getting food from the resort...remember the variability of the boxed lunches last time? And the hordes of people in line at the food courts?
 
If I lived on the Florida coast and had a reservation for Disney, I would agree that being inland is safer. We were at Disney for Hurricane Charlie ( which came ashore as a level 5 ) but was a level 4 or less when it hit Disney. Last year we were there for Matthew, which I believe was a level 4 when it came ashore . Disney and their staff were absolutely great. As others have said, bring food ,drink, and snacks if you can. Good Luck to all !!
 
We have a trip planned to arrive tomorrow. Friends/family think we're crazy but living in coastal Carolinas it seems like it would be the safer option to head to WDW to be surrounded by block/steel construction and back-up generators incase of power outage and access to an award winning dedicated disaster response team. Disney vacation club staff that we've talked to don't seem to be concerned even in the slightest and have stated on 4 separate calls that very few people have actually cancelled their stays. The only concern is will it be cleared up to return north next weekend?!?! :scared:
 
We were in the World for Matthew last October. Granted, Irma is a much more intense storm, but, we felt like Disney handled it very well. They used several modes of communication - text msg, MDE, Facebook, loud speaker(in the parks), and our hotel room phone. They kept us informed, got new updates approx every 2 hours. Our only issue was the food court after the parks had closed. It was just chaos! Of course we anticipated it would be, every guest at the resort was there getting meals for two days just in case! All in all if we were in Florida right now we would not hesitate to go to Disney! Have safe travels!
 
When we stayed at Jambo during Charley, it appeared that locals were hanging out in the lobby and playing board games in the activity room. We suspected they were families who had homes that might not withstand a hurricane. Charley was predicted to hit Tampa and hit Orlando instead, so many Tampa folks booked Orlando hotels.
 





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