Lights Out at Epcot
Sara K. Clarke and Jason R. Garcia | Orlando Sentinel Staff Writers
Most of Disney’s Epcot Center lost power this morning, according to park employees and visitors. Power was back on in some parts of the park in the afternoon, but some major attractions were down.
At about 1:30 p.m., Spaceship Earth and Journey Into Imagination were still listed as “down,” according to a park board that updates visitors on the status of rides. Honey, I Shrunk the Audience was closed, but it wasn’t clear whether that was because of the outage. Contacted early this afternoon, Disney spokeswoman Kim Prunty said she had not yet heard of the outage.
It was not immediately clear what caused the outage. There was a long line at Guest Relations, where some visitors were trying to get refunds or tickets to transfer to a different Disney park. One guest said people were given the option of getting a Park Hopper ticket to use today or a one-day pass to use another day.
Power went down about 11:30 a.m., said Bobbi Baessler, a park visitor from Chicago. “We saw the monorail, and it was stopped,” said Baessler, who was in line hoping for a refund or admission to another park. “We were waving to all the people. At least we weren’t stuck up there.” Baessler said it was her family’s last day in Orlando. “So it’s not like we can come back tomorrow.”
Tom Connelly, of New York, said he was waiting for the Living with the Land ride with his family of five when the line stopped moving. They eventually got out of line and went looking for another attraction. “We were walking around from ride to ride,” he said. “Everything was closed.”
One thing that added to confusion was that many park workers were reluctant to say why rides were closed, Connelly said. He and his family passed the time by going to the World Showcase, which had power. But outside concessions there were closed as well, and many vendors were draining their freezers, he said.