Credit: Inside the MagicWhen you are visiting Walt Disney World Resort, there are rules that guests should follow, and while it is quite simple to abide by the rules, not all guests adhere to them all of the time.
At all of the Walt Disney World theme parks (Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, Disney’s Hollywood Studios, and Disney’s Animal Kingdom), there are a few steps that guests must go through in order to enter the park. Of course, a ticket needs to be purchased; then once you arrive at your theme park, you will have to undergo security.
In most cases, security is a very fast process thanks to new scanners that Disney has added to their parks. You simply need to walk through them, and only certain metals will set it off. In most cases, guests are clear about going through it without a hitch. If the scanner does go off, guests move into a short line where security will do a quick bag check and then let them move into the queue to enter the park.
Once you arrive at the Mickey tap entrance, a cast member will guide you to tap your ticket, phone, or MagicBand to the scanner, followed by your fingerprint to enter the park, and voilà, you are in!
It is not a difficult or a long process, but there are some guests who are rather impatient, and will try to bypass these steps, which is not allowed.
A recent Reddit post shared a story where one guest saw another sneak past security without anyone catching them.
The post reads:
“Guest pulled into security check line at AK ran out and into the park without security noticing them
Was at AK last month and a woman who was with a friend said they can’t get checked as they have fast passes. Security tells them your friend can go you have to line up.
Few minutes later while in the security line, she run under the rope and head towards park entrance at top speed.
All guests waiting were just staring and figuring out what happened as all security guards did not notice this at all. Somebody informed them and that was the last I heard or saw of it.
It’s very concerning that this was able to happen, was there with my family and wouldn’t want somebody sneaking into the park by just running out of the security check line.”
If the guest had a “FastPass”, which would technically be the newly renamed Lightning Lane Multi Pass, that means that they would have had to have a valid ticket for the park, as that is the only way that one can make and purchase Lightning Lanes, so that means that the guest did not sneak into the park without payment, but they did sneak into the park without going through security, which is concerning.
It was not stated what happened to the guest, but if a guest disobeys the rules and regulations set out by Disney, there is a good chance that the House of Mouse will give them the boot with a trespass notice.
This is something that Disney has been doubling down on when it comes to rule-breakers, as we have even seen social media content creators get a lifetime ban from the most magical place on earth after breaking the rules.
The comments on the post have since exploded.
One reply stated, “They will most likely track her down inside the park. One time I didn’t see the guard waving me over to the bag check line at DHS and a security guard caught up to me on Grand Avenue 15 minutes later and looked through my hip bag there.”
Another replied, “Same exact thing happened to me. I had a cooler with breastmilk for my youngest (who was already in the park with family). I was with my oldest. Went through security, they waved me through. Got ONTO the monorail and a lady pulled me aside to check the cooler that was inside my bag. They definitely had eyes on this person but didn’t want to make it seem like a big issue to the other guests.”
One guest had witnessed a similar situation also at Animal Kingdom, “I was actually on AK, all the way back by Avatar, when I saw security approach someone and ask to search their bag. I heard them say something about bag check at the front of the park so I assume it was a similar situation. They skipped the front, and security easily found them inside the park.
It’s frustrating to wait sometimes, I get it, but I appreciate the safety measures to ensure an enjoyable day in the park!”
One reply came from what appears to be a security cast member at Disney who said, “Accurate. People just have no idea how robust the security process is in and around the parks. We don’t talk about it (for obvious reasons), but it’s incredibly rare for anyone to legitimately get past the security protocols.”
From all of this, it seems likely that Disney’s security team would have caught this running guest once they entered the park, either to check their bag or remove them entirely. The level of punishment is up to Disney, as they are on private property.
Going through security is a critical step in the Disney parks experience, as it is the one way that all guests can know that they are in a safe environment. Just a few weeks ago, panic ensued at Magic Kingdom after a fight caused a balloon to pop on Main Street, U.S.A., which led to some guests thinking a gunshot was heard.
Of course, guns are not allowed at Disney, nor could they pass the security scanners, so hearing a “gunshot” was an incredibly terrifying thing for guests to undergo. Thanks to Disney security, it was impossible for the sound to have been made by a real gun, but the panic felt by the guests and the lockdown that the park had to put in place was less than ideal.
Have you ever had any issues with security at Disney?