[UPDATE: Body of toddler has been recovered]
Walt Disney Co. closed all beaches in a Florida resort area out of caution after a 2-year-old boy was dragged by an alligator into a man-made lake next to one of its properties.
The Orange County Sheriff’s Office and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission continued their search Wednesday at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort & Spa in Lake Buena Vista. The child was about a foot away from the shore when he was snatched by the animal Tuesday night, despite his father’s struggle to rescue him. A lifeguard was on duty but unable to reach the child, according to the sheriff’s office.
“Everyone here at the Walt Disney World Resort is devastated by this tragic accident. Our thoughts are with the family,” the company said in a statement. “We are helping the family and doing everything we can to assist law enforcement.”
About nine different properties were affected by the beach closure, which will ensure visitors are safe and help investigators move watercraft into the area, Sheriff Jerry Demmings told reporters Wednesday. Disney park employees routinely track alligators and works with the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission to remove them, Nick Wiley, executive director of the wildlife agency, told reporters.
“Disney does everything by the book and they have an amazing program,” he said. “The story here is this is a tragedy — it’s terrible but it’s a rare occurrence. Fortunately it doesn’t happen very often and we’re doing everything we can to ensure it doesn’t happen again.”
The family, which was visiting from Nebraska, may be identified later Wednesday by authorities, Demmings said.
The incident is the latest in a series of tragic events in the past week in the Orlando area, a mecca for tourists since Walt Disney World opened in 1971. A gunman killed 49 people at a nightclub on Sunday morning, and singer Christina Grimmie was killed after a concert on Saturday.
Dennis Speigel, president of consulting firm International Theme Park Services, said he couldn’t recall another incident like the alligator attack.
“I don’t think it will impact their business at all,” he said. “Disney will beef up their internal control of their waterways and the alligator population I’m sure will be monitored more closely than it ever has been.”
He also didn’t think the nightclub shooting would significantly reduce visits to theme parks in Orlando.
“There’s 57 million tourists that went to theme parks last year,” he said. “Even if you lost 10 percent of that it’s not going to have an impact on the numbers at the parks.”
He added: “Our business is very resilient to these kinds of situations. People still come to theme parks to re-create and I don’t think that’s going to change.”
(c) 2016, Bloomberg ยท Gerry Smith
