Dangerous Bus Incident

[banimall]

I've been standing on a very crowded Disney bus before with the driver taking turns at what felt like 30mph, so yes they do get in a hurry and miscalculate. Luckily it was packed so tight no one fell over.

 

[OneLuckyMom]

When my daughter was 5, she was in a serious car accident with her babysitter. (By serious, I mean the car was totalled, the air bags deployed, etc. The babysitter had a slight injury to her arm. But no one had significant injuries, there was no rollover, etc.)

My daughter was clearly VERY upset that day. But as someone else said, kids are very resilient - they seem to move on and get over things much easier than most adults. She had a fear of her pillow for a night or two (took me a few minutes to figure out it was because of her airbag deployment) but then things passed. I talked with her about it all, made it clear it she was free to discuss her feelings about it whenever she needed to, but didn't really dwell on it TOO much. 2 years later, she still clearly remembers it all, but not with "terror" - she actually remembers it as not such a bad day because the babysitter bought her a stuffed animal and cheetos at the nearby convenience store while the police were writing up the report

It sounds to me like the whole thing that happened to your brother and niece was just an accident. Definitely not a "magical" moment, but all sorts of accidents are going to happen to us over the course of our lives. It sound like the driver may have rushed a bit but I have no doubt that if he had any idea she was there he wouldn't have closed the doors. It also sounds to me like Disney took the incident seriously, is going to address it with the driver, and provided reasonable accomodations to your brother's family for the problem. I think dwelling on it too much in a negative way, and repeating the "awful" story over and over is just more likely to keep your niece from moving past it with her normal "kid powers". I think if you talk more about the GOOD parts of the trip, your niece will be just fine and won't have any problem with busses in the future.

 

[palmage]

Im surprised its not on youtube.

You are toooo funny:ROFLOL: :ROFLOL:

 

[dhcalva]

I don't think that a pair of magnetic sensors and a pair of lights on each bus would cost much...

A simple sensor to detect if a door is open and if so turn on a light on the dashboard would probably help.

If you want to go overboard, have a cutoff installed in it that makes the bus unable to move if the door is detected as being open (with an override switch just in case of a 'Speed' moment).

I think the lights would be enough though.

 

[C&D]

The easiest and cheapest solution would be to no longer use the rear exit door. (and would probably be the solution Disney would choose if they had to make that decision, yielding to safety, if for instance litigation was involved)

No one was there, other than the original family to relay what happened; the story is all hear-say at this point and may have variated in the telling (if a fact could be told one way or another and one way substantiated the intent of the story teller and one way supported the other side, which way do you think the story is going to be told), so I think there is no correct response, only opinion to this post; anything else would be conjecture.

 

[Blackie Pueblo]

I've seen something like this happen before. A little girl was still on the bus and the doors closed before she got off and started to take off. Mother and father pounded on the door until the driver stopped.

Agreed it was simply a mistake but I'm glad everyone was ok. It sounds to me that Disney did try to make amends. At least they did try, some would have just said.. ahem.. Get over it.

What I'm worried about is how was their view towards Disney afterwards? Something like this can bug you if you let it and it can ruin your vacation.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~`
http://www.myspace.com/blackiepueblo

 

[Iakona]

From the feedback so far this seems to be a known problem that Disney should fix. Let's remember that this is WDW and a blindspot that does not take into account children (a major portion of their business) is just plain dumb.

 

[Shaman]

From the feedback so far this seems to be a known problem that Disney should fix. Let's remember that this is WDW and a blindspot that does not take into account children (a major portion of their business) is just plain dumb.

I'm sure they've looked into it (unless the incidents have not been reported and the drivers have kept quiet), but haven't figured out a cost effective way to fix the problem. I can't recall...but I think the newer buses have better visibility...I don't think they have anything obstructing plain view of the door and those infront of it.

 

[mk12a]

As a bus driver, I can give you some insight on this. This must have been one of the older RTS buses, because the back door on these buses will close if something/someone is in the way. On the Nova and Gillig buses, the doors have sensors so they will open if someone gets caught. We do have mirrors positioned at the rear door so that we can look in the rearview mirror to ensure that everyone is clear of the doors before we close them. Sometimes though, when the bus is full, it is hard to tell if everyone has safely exited the bus. And then you have those folks that try to enter through the back door....

I'm sure the little girl will forget about it...that is, if her parents let her forget about it. If they constantly bring it up, she probably will have a hard time forgetting it.

 

[Shaman]

As a bus driver, I can give you some insight on this. This must have been one of the older RTS buses, because the back door on these buses will close if something/someone is in the way. On the Nova and Gillig buses, the doors have sensors so they will open if someone gets caught. We do have mirrors positioned at the rear door so that we can look in the rearview mirror to ensure that everyone is clear of the doors before we close them. Sometimes though, when the bus is full, it is hard to tell if everyone has safely exited the bus. And then you have those folks that try to enter through the back door....

I'm sure the little girl will forget about it...that is, if her parents let her forget about it. If they constantly bring it up, she probably will have a hard time forgetting it.

Thanks! Now that I think about it, all the incidents I've witnessed may have been on the older buses.

 

[MickeyTigg]

Was the driver partly to blame? Yes...but I doubt that the driver can see a 5 year old very well for that door. That is why the parent is also mostly to blame. A parent should have been the last person of the family off that bus or have at a minimum held the hand of the child. What if the child got distracted and didn't get off the bus? Would we blame the bus driver too.

Yes, it probably was momentarily traumatic....but terror? Hardly. Compensation? You gotta be kidding me. Yeah...in our stupid litigious society it would probably be allowed and possibly win some money, but really. No one was permanently harmed or damaged in this case, so does anyone really think that compensation is warranted in this?

 

[miles1]

I'm not familiar with public transit and busses or whatever, but would it even be possible for safety measures to be implemented (such as some kind of sensor, like on elevators) with the doors opening/closing the way they do?

I think something SHOULD be done, but wonder, if something COULD be, we would have already seen it.

I can't imagine that this technology isn't already in place on the busses- It's built in to every single garage door opener sold in the US, however the home inspection business that I work for often finds it malfunctioning or improperly adjusted by the user. If you can buy the entire garage door opener for about $200, it would probably cost Disney less to retrofit it to one bus than to replace a tire on the same bus. Unfortunately, nothing is foolproof. (Not that the girl and her dad are fools, but any system is prone to malfunction at some point.)

 

[Laura]

I can't believe how often these incidents occur and nothing has been done.

I don't see why it would be a big deal for the bus driver to pick up the mic and say "PLEASE STAND CLEAR OF THE DOORS" before shutting them (they say that for a reason on the monorail!).

 

[Dwarful]

Ok I learn something new daily on this sight. We always have one adult lead out and one adult bring up the rear so to speak. This way we can always keep track of the kids.

We are going in August with our girl scout troop. Some will be bringing younger siblings so I guess I will add this info to my 'Disney Rules Packet" to ensure that no little ones are the last ones off the bus.

 

[KimnAbby]

I do think this incident was just an accident. How many buses run to and from Disney every day? And how often does something like this happen? Not very often. I have a four year old and I would probably be scared if it happened to her, but then again, she would be getting off the bus first to begin with.

I do think that having a private car is more than adequate compensation for what happened. It was, after all, an accident. They don't call them "On-purposes". Things happen sometimes.

I also wouldn't walk around telling everyone about it. It shouldn't be something to ruin your vacation. Your in the happiest place on Earth and it was one isolated incident. You shouldn't let it bring you down and ruin your whole trip and you probably shouldn't walk around telling everyone about that first. People want to hear about how great Florida was, not how you got stuck in a bus.

 

[gsimpson]

Be careful not to "teach terror"

My sister, who is a child psychologist, has told our whole family several times that when something happens scary to your little ones you should make a strong effort not to show fear or "terror" yourself, kids look to the adults to determine what level of anxiety to express and by getting over emotional or smothering when scary little mishaps occur you can unwittingly teach your young ones to over react or become unreasonably fearfull and this can cause long term social problems as they get older. Using her logic, if the parents really went over board on the sympathy and drama over this incident, then the little girl might really never be able to become a Disneyphile and worse yet could develop some geniune full blown phobias about busses or automatic doors in general.

 

[mk12a]

I can't believe how often these incidents occur and nothing has been done.

I don't see why it would be a big deal for the bus driver to pick up the mic and say "PLEASE STAND CLEAR OF THE DOORS" before shutting them (they say that for a reason on the monorail!).

Like anybody listens to the drivers when they talk on the PA. From my onwn personal experience, most of the time people talk louder when you are talking. It's really frustrating when you do the safety spiel and people talk louder because you are "interrrupting" their conversation. I know some guests are trying to listen, though. Hopefully it will be better with the new automated spiels.

 

[AEfx]

The level of safety is pretty sketchy on those busses (it's amazing that it's legal to smoosh so many people on, if that baby turns over half the people would die just from suffocation...), and the level of competence of the drivers varies considerably. Some of them are awesome, some of them are practically brain dead.

I like the bus system at WDW (but since I stopped flying and now drive myself I don't have nearly as much use for it), but I've always found myself trying very hard not to see the very obvious dangers all around from the drivers on down.

AEfx

 

[Mimi]

I need to make something clear. When I used the word compensation I was not talking about money. This family is not looking to get rich, their main concern is seeing that this does not happen again. I asked about compensation to get your feedback on whether that you feel the private car was adequate in light of the circumstances or based on situations you've heard of; my own personal question, born of curiosity.

I also asked about "reassurance" that the problem will be taken care of. In college I worked in a grocery store and when a customer would make a complaint about someone or something the manager would give them all the assurances in the world that the problem would be taken care of... and would then turn around and laugh with the employees.

If this problem is as common as it seems to be I can't help but wonder what would have to happen before Disney would either rethink their current training/discipline program or provide adequate safety features on ALL of their buses.

Maybe they subscribe to the old an-arm-and-leg-is-worth-this-much-and-the-cost-of-prevention-is-way-more-so -we'll-pass-on-safety-for-now style of doing business.

 

[flynnibus]

The level of safety is pretty sketchy on those busses (it's amazing that it's legal to smoosh so many people on, if that baby turns over half the people would die just from suffocation...),

Have you never riden on a city bus? Or even a bus around on a college campus?