Skyliner/Thunderstorms

Walt Disney World
1

I read on another forum that when thunderstorms roll through, they shut down the Skyliner, but that they do not start running buses unless the Skyliner has been shut down for the rest of the day. Instead, they wait 20 minutes after the last lightning in the area and then restart the Skyliner. So potentially, if there are scattered thunderstorms in the area, you could get stuck without either buses or the Skyliner. Can anyone confirm this?

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2

In December there were thunderstorms in the evening and the Skyliner was not running. We were in Epcot. They had busses running (we were staying at Pop) but we waited over an hour for one. From what I remember, they only had one bus stop for both AoA and Pop. It was a mess. By the time we got back to the room, we could see that the Skyliner was running. I wish we had waited out the storm and waited for the Skyliner. I’m not sure if that was the common occurrence or we just hit at a bad time. It was probably close to 9:00 PM.

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So it would seem that they DO start running buses when the Skyliner goes down based on your experience in December I wish there was solid information about how this works exactly.

4

They always have buses, they are just only one an hour.

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I guess I should clarify, I’m thinking about transportation from EP or HS back to the hotels. So if there are thunderstorms rolling through the area, are people going to be stranded at the parks? I know I’ve read that when the skyliner goes down people have to rely on busses from BWV to get back to their hotels. But do they start running those busses right away? How does it all work exactly?

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6

You wouldn’t be stuck, the once an hour bus service runs all day. I don’t know how soon they would run extra buses, if at all. Hopefully someone with more experience of a lengthy but not rest of the day Skyliner will chime in.

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7

Thus happened to us Friday. Staying at Pop, leaving HS. They stopped the skyliner due to lightening. They have to wait until 30 min from the last visible lightening. They had recovrry busses going to all skyliner hotels. They diverted some fro. DS and they were coming fairly continuously

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8

That is good to know. Thank you! Thunderstorms in Florida are a given, and I would expect Disney to have a plan in place to deal with it. But it seems like I’ve only read complaints about lack of busses and long waits.

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This seems like a flaw in the Skyliner plan - doesn’t run in thunderstorms in Florida? That’s like having a solar plant in Seattle or a wind turbine on the moon.

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Some other WDW things that don’t run under the same conditions of close-by lightning:

  • Seven Dwarfs Mine Train
  • Big Thunder Mountain
  • Splash Mountain
  • Tomorrowland Speedway
  • Astro-Orbiter
  • Test Track
  • Expedition Everest
  • Kilimanjaro Safari
  • Kali River Rapids
  • Slinky Dog Dash
  • Everything in Typhoon Lagoon
  • Everything in Blizzard Beach

By that count, WDW is pretty much a busted flush all summer long! Disney should sell the place to Chuck E. Cheese and cut their losses.

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11

It’s also a relatively good reason to be back napping at your hotel when the 3 O’Clock Thunderstorms roll through in the summer…

Seriously in the summer I’d heavily recommend rope drop through lunch, nap through the storms & then return somewhere for dinner and a cooler night. Of course that plan is greatly aided by park hopping and full hours which we don’t have right now… :cry:

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