Home

[The Butlin Boy]

Well Javey, I was being deadly serious. The dangers of costumed characters falling off oversized hub stages are in all the headlines in Toon Town right now. It's a big issue.

The old stage had lights around the top too. :wink:

That happened years ago when we were in the WDS. We wee watching Animagique, and one of the Pink elephant fell of a ledge. Five minutes later, the dhow was stopped due to 'technical difficulties', and some of later shows were cancelled. On our next trip,there was a small metal cable/barrier were he or she fell. So if you ever see that and wonder why it's there, now you know :wink:

[Javey74]

Well Javey, I was being deadly serious. The dangers of costumed characters falling off oversized hub stages are in all the headlines in Toon Town right now. It's a big issue.

The old stage had lights around the top too. :wink:

Really that bad..  :shock:  :shock:  

Though thinking of the characters on the OUADP floats, they don't move around that much and they are well harnessed in.  So I suppose characters moving about on a stage would certainly up the percentage of risk by at least 70%.. Mmmm, pause for thought..  :shock:

[Kristof]

Photos send in by our moderator Flor.

The first photo was taken from "front row" at the gate.  The satellite stage completely blocks the view of the main stage.



The satellite stage on the Castle side:





View from the Castle bridge:

[RnRCj]

Kristof - thank Flor for the photos! It seems the stage blocks out quite a bit of stuff if you're close up. However, from the castle bridge I think it looks rather good.

Really that bad..  :shock:  :shock:  

Though thinking of the characters on the OUADP floats, they don't move around that much and they are well harnessed in.  So I suppose characters moving about on a stage would certainly up the percentage of risk by at least 70%.. Mmmm, pause for thought..  :shock:

Oh it's a very serious issue. I've heard of several characters falling off stages before (witnessed it once). The thought of it may seem funny, but actually it's a big problem since quite a few CM's have been known to be hurt during falls.

[bigrossco]

such a shame you cant see the full stage! but looks nice all the same

[MagicKenny]

Not actually part of the show, but see main street:

[Kris]

The new stage format is great for people to get a close-up view when lots of people simply couldn't see before. However, so much of the performance won't be seen by everyone else. No wonder the cast of 40 is needed to cover such a space. All future productions will have to match this to simply keep people happy. A bit commitment!

I love how the (castle) satelite opens up for lighting and projections. Perfect

[-breeno-]

Thanks for sharing them photos Kristof, and thank Flor for taking them

Really that bad..  :shock:  :shock:  

Though thinking of the characters on the OUADP floats, they don't move around that much and they are well harnessed in.  So I suppose characters moving about on a stage would certainly up the percentage of risk by at least 70%.. Mmmm, pause for thought..  :shock:

Actually javey the characters on the OUADP aren't as safe as you'd think.  Back in my trip in 2007 i witnessed a character falling off one of the floats :shock:  We were at the Central Plaza area, just outside the Plaza Gardens Restaurant.  The float where the accident happened was the first float (i think it's the first, the one with Mickey, Minnie and Donald), now i don't know what went wrong, maybe the safety harness was faulty or something but when donald was turning around to face the side of main street i was on he must of lost his footing or something and just tumbled down :shock:  because of the crowds it's was hard to see as you can expect but poor donald definitely did hit the floor, CMs rushed over to donald immediately and the parade grounded to a halt, although the music carried on.  A stretcher was then carried out over to donald, it really must of been bad :shock:  but because of the crowds and with all the CMs around him i couldn't see if donald was on the stretcher or if he just limped away with the other CMs.  The parade then continued without donald.

[Aveen2008]

Thanks for posting the stage photos Kristof! It is a pity that the satalie stages block the view of the main stage and of a lot of the castle from close up, it seems odd that they designed it to be this way. from a far the stage looks good but up close not so good.

Thanks to MagicKenny for posting the photos of the street and the new signs/banners, they look great!! So good to see something new!

[MagicKenny]

And we have another picture. Not the best banners they could have used in my opinion. But they do look very fresh and cool.

[Pete's Dragon]

Really that bad..  :shock:  :shock:  

Though thinking of the characters on the OUADP floats, they don't move around that much and they are well harnessed in.  So I suppose characters moving about on a stage would certainly up the percentage of risk by at least 70%.. Mmmm, pause for thought..  :shock:

I've never seen anyone falling during the parade, but I know it happened during Animagique once. Just as Donald is leaving the vault, and the stage is dark apart from the signpost, there was an almightly thud, followed by a muffled '*&%$' !! After a minute of darkness and a lot of shuffling, the lights came up and the old 'stopped due to technical difficulties' speech was delivered.

Whether its a parade or a dimly lit stage, the restricted view the CM's have must be extremely hazardous. It makes me wonder what health and safety training they get.

[Javey74]

Well it seems to me that I've started off another topic here with character mis-haps just by chance, just through an off the cuff comment I made about characters falling of stages, not realising how much of a common occurence it was.    

I must say, of the 6 times I've been there and watched loads of parades, time and time again, I've never seen any character mis-haps.  In general all the parades and shows must be well co-ordinated, but oviously there will be mistakes made at times..  :wink:

[RnRCj]

In a way I actually prefer the new banners to the 15th ones. They blend in a little better. Still look bad though! :lol:

Well it seems to me that I've started off another topic here with character mis-haps just by chance, just through an off the cuff comment I made about characters falling of stages, not realising how much of a common occurence it was.

The one incident I saw was back in 2007, when we were watching the parade. On one of the parade stops the evil queen from Snow White must have lost her balance as the float came to a halt, and she went flying onto the ground. You should've heard the crowd as she went tumbling down. Her crown had even rolled several metres down Main Street (a child actually picked it up and it was never retrieved). A few of the CM's assisting the parade rushed over to her to help her up, and then as she stood up I noticed a big tear in the costume. :shock: She was also limping, but trying her hardest to keep acting - you could see it was hard for her. Seconds later a few "official" looking people rushed out and escorted her through one of the Main Street shops. But just before she got inside, believe or not, a pigeon swooped down leaving something rather nasty on her back. There was even some guy who was laughing at her.

As you can see Javey, it isn't really something to laugh about. Falling of can create very serious problems.

[Kris]

Painful stories! Are we still expecting the centre section of the main stage to levitate up to create a raised platform (like the concepts?). I know there's obviously the trap door that will launch at least Mickey up, but perhaps the raised platform will make this poor visibility better.

We've got to remember that although we can't see any of the main stage, people and characters will be standing at least 1.5 extra metres taller so we should see something...

[15MagicalYears]

Was there no preview recently?  Like Stitch?  :?: