Any talk that the fires are affecting occupancy rates at WDW?

Planogirl

I feel the nerd in me stirring
Joined
Aug 11, 2000
After reading about the problems with smoke in Central Florida, I started wondering if travelers might be canceling their trips. We go next week and have no intention of canceling but I am curious. As tempting as it is to hope that less people do arrive, it certainly wouldn't be good for Disney particularly with their current cost-slashing mind set. (And more importantly, not to mention the horrible tragedy of people being hurt or people's homes being threatened!)

Any news or thoughts?
 
Disney only gets smoke when the wind shifts, and so far, it hasn't affected attendance!
 
I was at WDW from 5/13 - 5/18 and the fires had kicked up on the 16th. That evening we went up to the observation deck on the Contemporary and saw a plane dropping a substance on the fire. This fire was about 10 miles away. The next morning the smoke smell was in the hallways and outside the resort (BW) but it wasn't overwhelming. We went to the MK that day - after we walked under the railway and looked down Mainstreet toward the castle we noticed something odd...We couldn't see the castle. It was a combination of smoke and fog that needed to burn off. The winds shifted and the smell and smoke were gone. On Friday there was a fire behind EPCOT that could be seen from TestTrack. There were several helicopters that were dropping water.
The only other issue with the fire is the lack of water at Donald's Boat in Toontown and the floating ball in TomorrowLand.
Sorry this is soooo long - what I'm trying to say is - it's not that bad. :cool:
 
The press does tend to blow things out of proportion of course but still the public perception of this possibly being a raging inferno could cause some cancellations. I've only run into one on the boards so far though so I guess that the desire for the mouse outweighs any tendency to panic. :)

Thanks.
 


The smoke got pretty thick Sat. night at A.K.L. it still was thick Sun. morning when we checked out. It didn't seem to have dampened A.K.L.'s bookings though.

The smoke form the fires was very bad in other areas of Central Florida as well, they closed almost every major highway Sun. morning that was near the Sea World and Disney area. This morning (Mon.) they had a 18 vehicle (mostly big trucks) accident on I-4, that had it shut down for awhile, so it's not being blown out of proportion by the media.
Luckily we got a little rain today but along with it came lightning which is not good when the vegetation down here in Florida is so dry.
 
Cancel my mid June vacation ? NO WAY
I just added an extra day !
hopefully it will thin the crowds out a little and make way for us diehards.
 
We just returned from the world late friday night. The first three days of our trip may 19-21, had some smoke but not bad enough to stop us. Sunday morning was our AK day. We noticed that is was fairly bad that morning, but burned off from the sun and change of wind in a matter of moments. The smoke could really be seen behind the Grand Floridian on our first day, it looked really close. We still had a great trip!!
 


Thanks for the updates and please continue to update the news, all of those DISers who hear something new. However our vacations turn out, how awful for the residents to live with this uncertainly every day.

I've noticed on some other threads that rumors are flying around. I guess that's to be expected with something like this.

I wish all residents and travellers alike all the best. :(
 
I have BWV reservations for the end of June. I wanted to prepend 1 day to my stay, and they weren't able to accommodate me in a 2br. I had to get 2 studios (and will have to do the dreaded room switch).

On a related note, I also have 2 rooms booked at the Hard Rock for the weekend preceding my BWV stay. I wasn't able to extend my stay there, either - so at least the Disney and Universal on-site hotels that I checked don't seem to have too many cancellations yet.

Gary
 
cough, cough, cough, I cough, cough, haven't cough, cough, cough, heard of cough, cough, any yet cough.;)
 

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