1. Disney bears zero responsibility. This was a wild animal in its natural habitat doing what it does. The signs clearly said no swimming and the kid was in the water at dark.

2. The parents bear very little responsibility. The child was not in deep water, presumably they were keeping their eye on him, they just didn't know about the gator. That is a safe assumption given the attacks are so so so incredibly rare as to not be a really reasonable fear.

3. That said, of course Disney writes a check for PR reasons and institutes preventive policies going forward for PR reasons. Might be a good deal on a new pair of boots coming up with all of the gators that are going to be harvested!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Someone died of something other than natural causes, so someone must be blamed.

I personally (PERSONALLY) hope the family doesn't come around to the thinking of "How much can we make from this?" IMO if Disney now puts up signage, that takes care of their end of it.

I don't think the signage was really necessary before given the history. FWIW, yes we've been to Disney World.

I doubt this is what the parents are thinking because no amount of money is going to bring their son back or erase the horrific images from their mind of watching him die the way he did. I'm not a litigious person and don't advocate suing people in 99% of cases but, in this case, Disney should be held responsible in some way for their liability in not warning people the alligators were in there. I don't think putting up signage after the fact is being held responsible.

+1.

Anonymous wrote:Beach or not, Disney or not, I fault the parents partially for allowing their toddler to wade on his own (I read they were sitting a few feet away) in murky, dirty, open waters in the dark. That is negligent. What if he ran off and fell from the steep drop off? If you are not holding a hand. It is dangerous. It is very sad for the family, but Disney is not entirely at fault here. If a sigh says no swimming, I would take it as stay the hell out of the water. Don't touch, wade or go near it.

Let's wait to judge until we have actual facts and not something you read on the internet that may or may not be true. Regardless of what happened they should in no way be blamed for this. It was a tragic accident.

Anonymous wrote:Someone died of something other than natural causes, so someone must be blamed.

I personally (PERSONALLY) hope the family doesn't come around to the thinking of "How much can we make from this?" IMO if Disney now puts up signage, that takes care of their end of it.

I don't think the signage was really necessary before given the history. FWIW, yes we've been to Disney World.

I doubt this is what the parents are thinking because no amount of money is going to bring their son back or erase the horrific images from their mind of watching him die the way he did. I'm not a litigious person and don't advocate suing people in 99% of cases but, in this case, Disney should be held responsible in some way for their liability in not warning people the alligators were in there. I don't think putting up signage after the fact is being held responsible.

Beach or not, Disney or not, I fault the parents partially for allowing their toddler to wade on his own (I read they were sitting a few feet away) in murky, dirty, open waters in the dark. That is negligent. What if he ran off and fell from the steep drop off? If you are not holding a hand. It is dangerous. It is very sad for the family, but Disney is not entirely at fault here. If a sigh says no swimming, I would take it as stay the hell out of the water. Don't touch, wade or go near it.

Someone died of something other than natural causes, so someone must be blamed.

I personally (PERSONALLY) hope the family doesn't come around to the thinking of "How much can we make from this?" IMO if Disney now puts up signage, that takes care of their end of it.

I don't think the signage was really necessary before given the history. FWIW, yes we've been to Disney World.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Look, ultimately, it was an accident. The parents should not be blamed. Disney should not be blamed. They will pay, which they should, but this was an incredibly unusual, freak accident. Sometimes, nobody is at fault.

How can you say, at this point, that Disney should not be blamed?

Because they cannot control mother nature, and had no reason to assume any child would be attacked and eaten by a gator on their property since it has never happened in the history of the park. And because there WERE no swimming signs. But since it did happen on their property, they should and will pay the family some damages. Held entirely to blame? No. They didn't have any foresight that this was an expected thing to happen.

It doesn't have to happen in their park for them to be liable re: signage. As you said, you can't control mother nature. So it's reasonable for Disney to assume there are gators in that area. In fact, they remove gators from their properties, so they DID know. So they have water with gators in them, and the response is to make a beachfront, invite families to gather there, and not post signage warning of said alligators (who do come out of the water onto shorelines to attack prey, and are very fast at doing so). Disney didn't post signage because it was very 'unDisney', i.e. it would interfere with the image they were trying to create, and would probably seriously affect the use of that beachfront by guests. They bet on the fact the gators would not be a problem. They bet wrong.

Ok. That's your opinion. I happen to think some accidents are so unusual as to be unable to pinpoint specific blame. If you disagree, that's fine.

I would say you are correct, were Disney not setting up events on that beachfront on a regular basis, without warning of gators, during prime gator feeding time.

+1 and lived in Florida for years

People posting pictures of rainbows at site where Lane died.


http://buzz.blog.ajc.com/2016/06/17/rainbows-and-maybe-an-angel-appear-at-the-site-of-gator-attack/

Yeah, I just feel that even if it's only happened once before, gator populations have been increasing dramatically over the past ten years, Disney was notified in many ways many times that gators were being fed by its guests and being seen from that beach, the cost/benefit analysis strongly weighs in the favor of basic preventative measures.

To the person who asked if people would follow the rules - if they're plainly made aware of the danger and elect not to follow the rules, then the risk lies with the person, who took their own calculated risk by choosing not to follow the rules. Disney would not face liability if there had been signs stating "danger: alligators in water" and someone elected to be near the water anyway. To those arguing that literally every person "should" know there are gators and other dangers in that sort of fresh water - that's for a court to decide, but there are enough people saying "I've been there and had no idea, it never occurred to me" etc, and enough people visiting Disney from faraway places (who've had no exposure or education about gators) that it's reasonable to assume not everyone would just inherently know.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Look, ultimately, it was an accident. The parents should not be blamed. Disney should not be blamed. They will pay, which they should, but this was an incredibly unusual, freak accident. Sometimes, nobody is at fault.

How can you say, at this point, that Disney should not be blamed?

Because they cannot control mother nature, and had no reason to assume any child would be attacked and eaten by a gator on their property since it has never happened in the history of the park. And because there WERE no swimming signs. But since it did happen on their property, they should and will pay the family some damages. Held entirely to blame? No. They didn't have any foresight that this was an expected thing to happen.

It doesn't have to happen in their park for them to be liable re: signage. As you said, you can't control mother nature. So it's reasonable for Disney to assume there are gators in that area. In fact, they remove gators from their properties, so they DID know. So they have water with gators in them, and the response is to make a beachfront, invite families to gather there, and not post signage warning of said alligators (who do come out of the water onto shorelines to attack prey, and are very fast at doing so). Disney didn't post signage because it was very 'unDisney', i.e. it would interfere with the image they were trying to create, and would probably seriously affect the use of that beachfront by guests. They bet on the fact the gators would not be a problem. They bet wrong.

Ok. That's your opinion. I happen to think some accidents are so unusual as to be unable to pinpoint specific blame. If you disagree, that's fine.

I would say you are correct, were Disney not setting up events on that beachfront on a regular basis, without warning of gators, during prime gator feeding time.

"Florida is home to more than a million gators, but only a dozen or so bites are recorded each year, according to statistics from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission."

This is a sad and tragic accident. That said - I think a lot of resorts in Florida are going to be adding signs to their properties now.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Look, ultimately, it was an accident. The parents should not be blamed. Disney should not be blamed. They will pay, which they should, but this was an incredibly unusual, freak accident. Sometimes, nobody is at fault.

How can you say, at this point, that Disney should not be blamed?

because it was a wild predatory animal in its natural habitat and Disney had no swimming signs!

Also, they get like what, 20 million visitors a year? That's what I saw in one article. The possibility of this wasn't even on their radar. They'll put up the signs now, but I'm sure it won't be enough for some people. They'll still feed the gators.

I do wonder if people would have had the same outcry about a snake bite killing the child. Would people honestly say I didn't think there were snakes at Disney?

I agree - MILLIONS of people have been there with no alligator incident. Who could have foreseen this?? Certainly not the parents. I guess Disney could've been more pro-active but I don't really blame them.

The cost to Disney of informing its guests that gators were in very close proximity to its beaches would have been negligible. The cost to Disney of enforcing its "no feeding gators/wildlife" rules would have been negligible. Even if Disney believed there was little risk of a gator ever attacking, the cost of it maybe-possibly-one-day happening (a child's life) is so incredibly high, compared to the cost of taking basic and effective preventative measures, it's really hard for me to defend Disney's choice to ignore the issue.

Yes they could have done that but do you think people would have completely followed the rules? I doubt it. Because nothing like this had ever happened before. But you are right - they should've done it anyway.

There was a child attacked 30 years ago and his brother and sister fought off the gator. It's all over the internet. Why does everyone keep saying nothing like this has "ever" happened before?

because the percent of people visiting disney who are attacked by alligators is around .0000001%. maybe less. that said - disney should take all precautions.

Apparently Disney was aware of the problem. This changes my opinion. Still - millions and millions of people have visited and there have been around 2 or 3 incidents.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/disney-warned-alligators-one-went-062835940.html

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Look, ultimately, it was an accident. The parents should not be blamed. Disney should not be blamed. They will pay, which they should, but this was an incredibly unusual, freak accident. Sometimes, nobody is at fault.

How can you say, at this point, that Disney should not be blamed?

because it was a wild predatory animal in its natural habitat and Disney had no swimming signs!

Also, they get like what, 20 million visitors a year? That's what I saw in one article. The possibility of this wasn't even on their radar. They'll put up the signs now, but I'm sure it won't be enough for some people. They'll still feed the gators.

I do wonder if people would have had the same outcry about a snake bite killing the child. Would people honestly say I didn't think there were snakes at Disney?

I agree - MILLIONS of people have been there with no alligator incident. Who could have foreseen this?? Certainly not the parents. I guess Disney could've been more pro-active but I don't really blame them.

The cost to Disney of informing its guests that gators were in very close proximity to its beaches would have been negligible. The cost to Disney of enforcing its "no feeding gators/wildlife" rules would have been negligible. Even if Disney believed there was little risk of a gator ever attacking, the cost of it maybe-possibly-one-day happening (a child's life) is so incredibly high, compared to the cost of taking basic and effective preventative measures, it's really hard for me to defend Disney's choice to ignore the issue.

Yes they could have done that but do you think people would have completely followed the rules? I doubt it. Because nothing like this had ever happened before. But you are right - they should've done it anyway.

There was a child attacked 30 years ago and his brother and sister fought off the gator. It's all over the internet. Why does everyone keep saying nothing like this has "ever" happened before?

Disney assumed too much for it's visitors. Florida=alligators in fresh water. Now Disney will put up gator signs and I suppose pay out millions to the family.

People need to be aware in all regions-coyotes, snakes, alligators, bear, etc. http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/breaking-news/os-alligator-eats-orlando-man-dog-20140901-story.html