Anyone else rethinking riding the Gondolas?

[ofcabbagesandkings]

Nope. I was thinking of adding a day to our trip at CBR since the difference in flight fares for 3 for our return would make up the cost of the room. But now I'm just going to stick to our original dates.

 

[Moliphino]

I use to live in Albuquerque and have ridden the Sandia Tram, the longest aerial tram in the US, so ridding this wouldn't bother me in the least. However, since this happened my concern now is, if this were to happen again and they needed to evacuate all the gondolas, how long it take to evacuate everyone? If necessary, how would you evacuate those in gondolas over water? Just thinking aloud. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure this is a safe and secure system and I plan on riding it, but thinking out loud.

They have a special boat for Hourglass Lake. Not sure about the bit near IG.

 

[MooseBucks]

We still plan to ride but probably not if we’re in a rush for rope drop or an ARD etc... maybe a on the way “back to the resort” sort of thing

 

[Cynner]

I'm afraid of heights AND claustophobic, but I still intend to ride them. Call me crazy ;P If I get stuck, I will definitely be one of the people fighting a panic attack. But I've always refused to be limited by my fears

 

[StitchesGr8Fan]

Nope. Busses crash, monorails crash, boats sink. I’m taking a risk in any of them. The only Disney transportation that hasn’t had an issue in recent years is the boats, and they could hypothetically sink and force you to swim through alligators to safety. So I will ride the Skyliner because Disney wants me to have a safe ride as much as I do and I have no doubt they have lots of smart minds figuring out what went wrong.

 

[sponica]

I'm afraid of heights AND claustophobic, but I still intend to ride them. Call me crazy ;P If I get stuck, I will definitely be one of the people fighting a panic attack. But I've always refused to be limited by my fears

I'd rather be stuck in it than rescued via cherry picker. I'd wave off the fire department. They might have to tranquilize me like one of those bears that gets stuck in a city tree...

But yeah, I hope they figure out what went wrong and it's up and running by next July.

 

[Sarahleigh]

According to the poster who was in the first yellow gondola

“We noticed our doors were bent and weren’t shut all he way. There was definitely body damage to our car and several others, including broken vents.”

That’s the result of a stronger impact than a bump.

Sure. Stronger impact than a bump, fine... they crashed/smashed/collided/bumped into each other. But not crushed was the point.

 

[dreynolds1982]

Any reservations I have about riding them has nothing to do with safety and more to do with "are they actually a better/more efficient method of transportation than the other options." We are going the second week of November so there's still some time so see how things smooth out over the next couple of weeks. We get down there early on a non-park day for us, so I think we will hop on it and maybe ride the full route, see how long it takes, etc. to determine if we will use it for actual park transportation or not. At the very least, I want to ride them once around just for fun.

I think, from what I've read, that if they are running full-steam ahead, no issues, they are great, but I also don't want to be heading to the parks one morning and get stuck on them for an hour, missing our first FPs or something!

 

[olecow]

I'm not rethinking at all. We're staying at POP this January and looking forward to using them.

 

[stephk1981]

DS and I were already definitely hesitant before the incident....neither of us are fond of being in a gondola hanging how many feet in the air without anything under us. The accident sealed it for us! I had actually booked the Riviera Resort on the Spring discount too, we have changed resorts and will not be riding in the gondolas anytime in the future.

 

[rinnythepooh]

According to the poster who was in the first yellow gondola

“We noticed our doors were bent and weren’t shut all he way. There was definitely body damage to our car and several others, including broken vents.”

That’s the result of a stronger impact than a bump.

The gondola was squeezed between two other gondolas untill the vents popped out, the metal dented and the door bent. That is crushed to me.

 

[smallworldnh]

I was not interested before this and I'm definitely not now for no other reason other than I didn't care one way or the other about the gondolas. I hope people keep riding them if it means less people on the buses!

 

[Chickinvic]

I'll ride them.

 

[North of Mouse]

DS and I were already definitely hesitant before the incident....neither of us are fond of being in a gondola hanging how many feet in the air without anything under us. The accident sealed it for us! I had actually booked the Riviera Resort on the Spring discount too, we have changed resorts and will not be riding in the gondolas anytime in the future.

Do you fly in airplanes?

 

[stephk1981]

Do you fly in airplanes?

Lol....yes. I used to work for Delta actually. I have had an incident on a chairlift in Gatlinburg a few years ago. Bad memories that DS and I definitely don't want a repeat of! The gondolas remind me of that. I was all for giving them a chance, but being stuck like that and evacuated by the fire department.....my worst nightmare!

 

[MomOTwins]

This seems to be a pretty serious design flaw. I can understand how the entire line might stop if a gondola got jammed, and the jammed gondola would need to be fixed before the line starts moving, but I don't understand how there are not safety measures to prevent the other gondolas from piling up into it if one gondola gets jammed. Disney has figured this out everywhere else in its parks: if a train on 7DMT malfunctioned, you can bet they have system in place to stop the train behind it before it before they crash together!

 

[bakerworld]

Well, if the mood strikes, we'll take a chance. I do plan to hit the BR before I ascend.

 

[OasterP]

We rode them a bunch on our trip last week. We did jokingly comment that it looked like our car might crash into another when coming into the "station", but thankfully didn't happen while we were on our trip (well to us - it happened the night we left).

I'm so glad it appeared that everyone is ok. As far as the crushed/crash "debate", it's semantics. It would have been scary for sure to be in that car. To me it wasn't crushed, and I'm so thankful, because to me if it was crushed - people wouldn't be tweeting about their experience in that particular car.

I'd ride again but gosh it must have been incredibly unearving to those who were stuck! I'm fairly certain if I was one of the ones stuck for hours, particularly over water - I might not be in a hurry to get on them again.

 

[Jennasis]

Well, here's what the dictionary says...

crush
[ kruhsh ]SHOW IPA
SYNONYMS|EXAMPLES|WORD ORIGIN
SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR crush ON THESAURUS.COM
verb (used with object)
to press or squeeze with a force that destroys or deforms.
to squeeze or pound into small fragments or particles, as ore, stone, etc.
to force out by pressing or squeezing; extract:to crush cottonseeds in order to produce oil.
to rumple; wrinkle; crease.
to smooth or flatten by pressure:to crush leather.
to hug or embrace forcibly or strongly:He crushed her in his arms.
to destroy, subdue, or suppress utterly:to crush a revolt.
to overwhelm with confusion, chagrin, or humiliation, as by argumentation or a slighting action or remark; squelch.
to oppress grievously.
Archaic. to finish drinking (wine, ale, etc.).

If the car was dented I suppose it qualifies as deformed? I also imagine that the cars involved are removed from service, perhaps permanently (does that count as destroyed since they cannot perform their function anymore LOL). Eh.

 

[Pappy Tom]

You say "Lovingly Bumped" , I say "TOTAL CARNAGE!!!"
Oh, the humanity!!!!

Wow, just goes to show how easily bent out of shape (just like the Skyliner gondolas) people can become about certain points of view, especially if they feel slighted. For heaven sakes, there was damage, regardless of the severity; let's agree about that.

Can't we all just get along?