Disneyland Fantasmic Dragon Engulfed in Flames

flynnibus

flynnibus

Premium Member
shambolicdefending said:
This is the key point, IMO.

Contrary to some sentiment I've seen online, I think this incident shows that Disney is actually quite well-prepared and safe in events like this. A huge four-story prop went up in flames in a matter of seconds, but trained personnel were immediately on the scene to isolate the fire and prevent any spread, while all other cast members were quickly whisked out of harms way.
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I'm not ready to praise them in those elements.

1 - they clearly did not stop the show at the first signs of the pyro failure. The prop clearly failed with an uncontrolled burn emerging and the show continued (with the performer near by) for some time before they hit the show stop. Their monitoring and assessment of these effects or the safety officer decision here was delayed.
2 - they did not have an immediate response, and the 'containment' pitch is weak at best. They didn't deploy any resources that could have contained the fire. They were aided by the fact the prop is basically physically isolated and all the burning materials were heavy and dropping in it's own footprint. If there were embers flying off and going into the trees or the cabin... you think the guy with the little 50lb water fire extinguisher was gonna contain it? :)
3 - It's obvious they did not have a plan in place to self-address any sizable fire - likely only issues thought to be spot or performer issues. What happened here was not something they were prepared to address with onsite resources. It's debatable what scope they should be prepared to handle with onsite on standby resources vs a FD response... but the loss of a major show element like this with what is likely significant infrastructure damage would certainly cause anyone to reassess if their prior posture was the correct one to have.
4 - They did not have a planned response ready for the crowd - or at least didn't activate it - to ensure there wasn't a crowd panic. I would have expected a more direct crowd engagement when faced with something this dramatic to help keep the crowd calm and ensure a controlled movement of the crowd. I'm not saying anyone was in immediate danger from the fire, but you have to keep the mob from exploding on its own.

These points lead me to believe this accident was not one they had prepared for. It suggests they had probably too high of confidence in their safety systems and were not expecting to have to deal with a breach of those systems.

Some FOIA requests to see when the radio calls went out would be interesting :)
 
CaptinEO

CaptinEO

Well-Known Member
To be honest I'm not seeing the outrage at their safety procedures. An accident happened, they resolved it, didn't cause a panic, and guests and staff are fine.

The fire wasn't going to magically jump across the 30 feet of water to to the guests. The real safety concern was to staff on Tom Sawyer Island.

Clearly they had fire personnel standing by who put out the fire.

The guests were safe and clearly didn't feel in danger.

Also to those saying guests attending are tasteless for making jokes in the situation, humor for many, myself included, is a defense/recovery mechanism. Sometimes after being scared and having an adrenaline rush a bit of humor can do wonders to calm things down.
 
J

jrhwdw

Well-Known Member
CaptinEO said:
To be honest I'm not seeing the outrage at their safety procedures. An accident happened, they resolved it, didn't cause a panic, and guests and staff are fine.

The fire wasn't going to magically jump across the 30 feet of water to to the guests.

Clearly they had fire personnel standing by who... put out the fire.
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Not going after Safety but The Dragon wasn't put out real quick.....
 
Andrew25

Andrew25

Well-Known Member
Apparently, every Disney fan is a fire safety expert, litigation expert, a consulting Imagineer, and has an economics degree from Harvard.

An accidental fire happened, whether or not it was due to a lack of maintenance we will never know, but it happened and they did the best they could do when a leak occurs.

This is the same company that knows the danger of fire and has protocols in place (e.g. Fantasyland sprinklers for fireworks at MK).
 
lazyboy97o

lazyboy97o

Well-Known Member
jrhwdw said:
After it lit up the whole thing!! Shouldn't there be Sprinklers on TSI for this????? I'm not knocking DL at all for guests safety, I'm just sad we lost the whole Dragon!!!!!
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Where would these sprinklers have been located? Containing a fire is part of fire resistance design in buildings.
 
𝕴𝖒𝖆𝖌𝖎𝖓𝖊𝖊𝖗97

𝕴𝖒𝖆𝖌𝖎𝖓𝖊𝖊𝖗97

Well-Known Member
In the Parks
No
CaptinEO said:
It was put out within minutes.
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Most of the full-length videos of the blaze last about 11 minutes before they are escorted away from the scene, and the fire isn't anywhere near done burning at the end. I would say the fire was burning far longer than anyone wanted. It sounds like Disney PR to say "The fire was put out within minutes."

It was an awful scene that lasted far longer than if they had been prepared for the likely possibility that a fire effect might malfunction and set other things on fire. Something should have been inspected that would have prevented this, I would think. I don't claim to be an expert, just seems like if they had inspected [insert whatever actually failed here], they might have prevented it. Maybe they didn't realize whatever [it] is needed to be inspected, so maybe it's no one's fault. But when dealing with fire, always ask the question: what can go wrong?
 
S

shambolicdefending

Well-Known Member
flynnibus said:
I'm not ready to praise them in those elements.

1 - they clearly did not stop the show at the first signs of the pyro failure. The prop clearly failed with an uncontrolled burn emerging and the show continued (with the performer near by) for some time before they hit the show stop. Their monitoring and assessment of these effects or the safety officer decision here was delayed.
2 - they did not have an immediate response, and the 'containment' pitch is weak at best. They didn't deploy any resources that could have contained the fire. They were aided by the fact the prop is basically physically isolated and all the burning materials were heavy and dropping in it's own footprint. If there were embers flying off and going into the trees or the cabin... you think the guy with the little 50lb water fire extinguisher was gonna contain it? :)
3 - It's obvious they did not have a plan in place to self-address any sizable fire - likely only issues thought to be spot or performer issues. What happened here was not something they were prepared to address with onsite resources. It's debatable what scope they should be prepared to handle with onsite on standby resources vs a FD response... but the loss of a major show element like this with what is likely significant infrastructure damage would certainly cause anyone to reassess if their prior posture was the correct one to have.
4 - They did not have a planned response ready for the crowd - or at least didn't activate it - to ensure there wasn't a crowd panic. I would have expected a more direct crowd engagement when faced with something this dramatic to help keep the crowd calm and ensure a controlled movement of the crowd. I'm not saying anyone was in immediate danger from the fire, but you have to keep the mob from exploding on its own.

These points lead me to believe this accident was not one they had prepared for. It suggests they had probably too high of confidence in their safety systems and were not expecting to have to deal with a breach of those systems.

Some FOIA requests to see when the radio calls went out would be interesting :)
Click to expand...
I think most of your points here are based on assumptions and conjecture and have no resemblance to the reality of what emergency response is really like, and what the key priorities would be in this kind of situation.
 
flynnibus

flynnibus

Premium Member
CaptinEO said:
It was put out within minutes.
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By what clock is that?

I know it burned uncontrolled for more than 10mins.. and from I can tell so far more burned itself out rather than being put out. I've yet to see any footage of the fire dept response.. only the aftermath.
 
flynnibus

flynnibus

Premium Member
shambolicdefending said:
I think most of your points here are based on assumptions and conjecture and have no resemblance to the reality of what emergency response is really like, and what the key priorities would be in this kind of situation.
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So you don't have a response? Got it.

Most of those responses are direct observations - no conjecture needed. The data is in the video.
 
S

shambolicdefending

Well-Known Member
flynnibus said:
So you don't have a response? Got it.

Most of those responses are direct observations - no conjecture needed. The data is in the video.
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Of course, I have a response. It's just not one that agrees with you. You are free to dismiss it as you wish. Just as we are all free to judge or dismiss your viewpoints as we see fit.
 
flynnibus

flynnibus

Premium Member
shambolicdefending said:
Of course, I have a response. It's just not one that agrees with you. You are free to dismiss it as you wish. Just as we are all free to judge or dismiss your viewpoints as we see fit.
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Again with the hand waving instead of actual content.

You're gonna dispute
- The time when the show was cutoff?
- The absence of a fire response onsite?
- The absence of a direct PA instructions to the crowd?

I'd love to hear what you watched.
 

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