Photos shared on social media Friday showed crews putting up posts and ropes, apparently to block guests from getting too close to the water at the Grand Floridian Resort. The beach had “no swimming” signs but none warning about alligators.
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Workers are installing temporary barriers and more signs where an alligator killed a 2-year-old boy at the Walt Disney World Resort. Many visitors questioned why signs didn’t more explicitly warn about alligators for out-of-state tourists who may not have realized the dangers.
A statement by Disney spokeswoman Jacquee Wahler said the company was also conducting a “swift and thorough review of all of our processes and protocols”.
Workers were spotted erecting a wood and rope fence on the shoreline of the Seven Seas Lagoon off the Grand Floridian Resort & Spa where little Lane Graves of Nebraska was snatched by an alligator and dragged through the water Tuesday night in front of his horrified family.
In Florida, a state with an estimated 1.3 million alligators, sightings are common but attacks are rare.
Matt and Melissa Graves, the parents of the 2-year-old boy, said in a statement released Thursday that they were “devastated” following the death of their son.
The company said it will now add alligator warnings.
Trappers have captured and killed at least five alligators since Tuesday’s attack in hopes of finding the alligator that killed Lane, but a determination has not been made as to whether they have caught the animal responsible. The father “struggles with the alligator (and the) alligator pulls the child into the water and they disappeared”.
“We are devastated and ask for privacy during this extremely hard time”, said the statement, released by a family friend Thursday.
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Lane’s body has been turned over to the Orange County Medical Examiner’s Office for an autopsy. “To all of the local authorities and staff who worked tirelessly these past 24 hours, we express our deepest gratitude”, said the Graves.
