Closures, Cancellations, and Updates from Disney for Hurricane Irma

Updated September 10, 2017 at 12:00 pm EST

Hurricane Irma officially made landfall in the lower Florida Keys this morning and is now tracking North towards the Tampa Bay area. Winds began to pick up in the Orlando/Disney World area yesterday and will continue to do so as the worst from the storm is expected overnight in Central Florida. Hurricane Irma is currently still a Category 4 Hurricane and packing winds up to 130 miles per hour. The eye of the storm is currently 80 miles SSE of Naples, FL.

The parks at Disney World are closed and are scheduled to be so through tomorrow, Monday, September 11. Guests are advised to hunker down in their resorts to ride out the storm. Cast Members are taking great care of guests who have evacuated from the storm and/or are currently stranded inside the resorts. Characters have been spotted at several of the resorts and extra activities have been planned for guests to pass the time.

It’s so crazy to see all the parks closed in the middle of a Sunday!

Reports indicate that around a million people are without power in the state of Florida. Most of the outages are concentrated to the southern part of the state including the Florida Keys, Miami-Dade County, and Broward County. No outages have been reported at Disney World at this time.

Keep following along as we will continue to post all the latest Hurricane Irma and Disney World updates!

Updated September 9, 2017 at 12:00 pm EST

Cancellations and Closures: 

• Disney’s Blizzard Beach® Water Park: Closed as of Friday, 9/8 – Monday, 9/11
• Disney’s Typhoon Lagoon® Water Park: Closing Saturday 9/9 at 5 p.m. – Monday, 9/11
• ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex: Closed on Saturday, 9/9 – Monday, 9/11
• Disney’s Animal Kingdom® Theme Park: Closing on Saturday, 9/9 at 7 p.m. – Monday, 9/11
• Disney’s Hollywood Studios®: Closing on Saturday, 9/9 at 7 p.m. – Monday, 9/11
• Epcot®: Closing on Saturday, 9/9 at 9 p.m. – Monday, 9/11
  • The Saturday, 9/9 Illuminations: Reflections of Earth performance is canceled.
• Magic Kingdom® Park: Closing on Saturday, 9/9 at 9 p.m..
  • The Saturday, 9/9 Happily Ever After fireworks performance is canceled.
• Disney Springs: Closing on Saturday, 9/9 at 9 p.m. – 9/11
• La Nouba by Cirque du Soleil 9 p.m. show canceled on Saturday, Sept. 9.
• Disney’s Hilton Head Island Resort will close Saturday, Sept. 9 at 10 a.m.
• Disney’s Vero Beach Resort closed as of Friday, Sept. 7 at 2 p.m.
• Disney’s Fort Wilderness Resort & Campground and Disney’s Saratoga Springs Treehouses will be closed beginning Saturday, Sept. 9 at 2 p.m.
• Night of Joy at ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex has been canceled on Saturday, Sept. 9, 2017. The performances on Friday, Sept. 8 will take place as planned.
  • Guests with tickets for Saturday are welcome to attend Friday’s event instead by exchanging their tickets at the ESPN Wide World of Sports Box Office after 4 p.m. Friday.
  • Requests for a full refund for either event night will be honored.

• Mickey’s Not-So-Scary Halloween Party has been canceled on Sunday, Sept. 10, 2017. The event will take place as planned on Thursday, Sept. 7. Guests are invited to exchange their Sunday, Sept. 10 event tickets for one of the following options:
  • Tickets to attend another Mickey’s Not-So-Scary Halloween Party
  • Tickets to attend an upcoming Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party
  • 1-Day Magic Your Way Tickets with Park Hopper Option, to be used within the next 2 years
  • Receive a full refund for event tickets
• Disney Resort Transportation from Animal Kingdom and Hollywood Studios will end at 8 pm on Saturday, September 9.
• Disney Resort Transportation from Epcot and Magic Kingdom will end at 10 pm on Saturday, September 10.

Storm Updates and Impact Orlando

Currently, Hurricane Irma is 90 miles ESE of Cuba and packing winds of 125 miles per hour or a Category 3 Hurricane. Winds did decrease overnight when the storm moved over Cuba but are expected to re-intensify before making landfall somewhere in Florida. Irma is currently moving west at 9 miles per hour.

Currently, there are 30,000 people without power in the state of Florida. Mostly in Miami-Dade and Broward counties. Per the following tweet, hundreds of utility trucks have been spotted in the parking lot at Epcot.

Unreal. Probably over a thousand utility trucks staged at EPCOT pic.twitter.com/4ujCANj1Mp

— ?Drunk@Disney? (@DrunkAtdisney) September 9, 2017

The Weather Channel is forecasting the following impacts for the Orlando area:

• Tropical storm-force winds begin: Sunday afternoon
• Hurricane-force winds begin: Late Sunday night
• Strongest winds, timing: Overnight Sunday night

Updated September 8, 2017 at 5:30 pm EST

• Disney’s Blizzard Beach® Water Park: Closed as of Friday, 9/8 – Monday, 9/11
• Disney’s Typhoon Lagoon® Water Park: Closing Saturday 9/9 at 5 p.m. – Monday, 9/11
• ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex: Closed on Saturday, 9/9 – Monday, 9/11
• Disney’s Animal Kingdom® Theme Park: Closing on Saturday, 9/9 at 7 p.m. – Monday, 9/11
• Disney’s Hollywood Studios®: Closing on Saturday, 9/9 at 7 p.m. – Monday, 9/11
• Epcot®: Closing on Saturday, 9/9 at 9 p.m. – Monday, 9/11
  • The Saturday, 9/9 Illuminations: Reflections of Earth performance is canceled.
• Magic Kingdom® Park: Closing on Saturday, 9/9 at 9 p.m..
  • The Saturday, 9/9 Happily Ever After fireworks performance is canceled.
• Disney Springs: Closing on Saturday, 9/9 at 9 p.m. – 9/11
• La Nouba by Cirque du Soleil 9 p.m. show canceled on Saturday, Sept. 9.
• Disney’s Hilton Head Island Resort will close Saturday, Sept. 9 at 10 a.m.
• Disney’s Vero Beach Resort closed as of Friday, Sept. 7 at 2 p.m.
• Disney’s Fort Wilderness Resort & Campground and Disney’s Saratoga Springs Treehouses will be closed beginning Saturday, Sept. 9 at 2 p.m.
• Night of Joy at ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex has been canceled on Saturday, Sept. 9, 2017. The performances on Friday, Sept. 8 will take place as planned.
  • Guests with tickets for Saturday are welcome to attend Friday’s event instead by exchanging their tickets at the ESPN Wide World of Sports Box Office after 4 p.m. Friday.
  • Requests for a full refund for either event night will be honored.

• Mickey’s Not-So-Scary Halloween Party has been canceled on Sunday, Sept. 10, 2017. The event will take place as planned on Thursday, Sept. 7. Guests are invited to exchange their Sunday, Sept. 10 event tickets for one of the following options:
  • Tickets to attend another Mickey’s Not-So-Scary Halloween Party
  • Tickets to attend an upcoming Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party
  • 1-Day Magic Your Way Tickets with Park Hopper Option, to be used within the next 2 years
  • Receive a full refund for event tickets

Updated September 8, 2017 at 3:30 pm EST

Disney World has just announced the falling closures to their parks:

• Epcot and Magic Kingdom will be closing at 9 pm on Saturday evening and will remain closed on Sunday and Monday
• Animal Kingdom and Hollywood Studios will be closing at 7 pm on Saturday evening and will also remain closed Sunday and Monday
• The folowing nightitme shows are cancelled for Saturday evening: Illuminations, Fantasmic!, Star Wars: A Galactic Spectacular, and Rivers of Light

Updated September 8, 2017 at 10:00am EST

Disney has just announced no Advanced Dining Reservations will be accepted for Sunday, September 10 and Monday, September 11. Cancellation fees for reservations have also been waived for this time period.

Port Canaveral will close today, Friday, September 8, at 3 pm EST. No time has been announced for when it will reopen.

Update from Disney Cruise Line for Future Bahamian and Eastern Caribbean Sailings: At this time, there are no changes to other sailings on the Disney Dream and Disney Fantasy. However, we continue to closely monitor Hurricane Irma and assess its impact on the ports of call we visit in the Caribbean and Bahamas. Updates regarding any necessary itinerary changes will be posted beginning September 12. While we always strive to deliver magical cruise vacations, nothing is more important to us than providing a safe experience for our guests and crew. We will continue to closely monitor the weather and provide updates as necessary.

Update September 7, 2017 at 5:00pm EST

Disney World will be closing the Fort Wilderness Resort and Campground on Saturday, September 9th. We will have more details on this soon.

Also, Disney World will be canceling their performances of Mickey’s Backyard BBQ and Hoop-Dee-Doo Revue on September 9th, 10th, and 11th.

Disney’s Vero Beach Resort in Vero Beach, FL will close Friday September 8th at 2 p.m

Disney “Spirit of Aloha” dinner show at the Polynesian Village that is scheduled for Saturday, September 9th has been canceled.

The Highway in the Sky Dine Around for September 9th has also been canceled.

Disney’s Hilton Head Island Resort will close on Saturday, September 10th at 10 a.m.

Updated September 7, 2017 at 2:30 pm EST

Updated below under closures and cancellations to add Food & Wine Festival Events, Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party, and Night of Joy Event.

With Hurricane Irma bearing down on the state of Florida right now, Disney World has released an official statement and started to announce closures ahead of the storm.

The following statement was posted by Disney World for Travel Agents this morning at 9 am EST. There is a similar message on the official Disney World consumer site.

Tropical Weather Update

Walt Disney WorldResort is operating under normal conditions. We continue to monitor the path of Hurricane Irma and are taking the necessary steps to ensure the safety of our Guests and Cast Members.

Please CLICK HERE to view the Hurricane Policy for Walt Disney World Resort.

Please note the Disney Reservation Center is currently experiencing heavy call volume. If you need to service a reservation for arrival between now and Sept. 13, 2017, we encourage you to stay on the line. If you need to service a reservation for arrival after Sept. 13, 2017 we recommend using your online booking tool, or call back at a later time.

I also noticed on the official Disney World consumer site that there is a “live chat” option for questions pertaining to Hurricane Irma.

Closures and Cancellations

Disney has announced the following closures. We will keep this list updated as the come in:

• Blizzard Beach is scheduled to be closed September 8 and 9
• Aerophile or the hot air balloon at Disney Springs is closed and appears to be so through September 13
• Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party has been canceled for this Sunday, September 10
• Night of Joy for Saturday, September 9 has been canceled
• The What’s Cooking with Alex Guarnaschelli at Epcot’s Food and Wine Festival on Sunday, September 10 has been canceled
• Mix It, Make It, Celebrate It Event at Epcot’s Food & Wine Festival on Monday, September 11 and Tuesday, September 12 has been canceled
• Mickey’s Backyard BBQ and Hoop-Dee-Doo Revue on September 9th, 10th, and 11th.
• Spirit of Aloha at the Polynesian has been closed for September 9th
• Highway in the Sky Dine Around for September 9th has been canceled

For updates to transportation in and out of the state of Florida, please CLICK HERE.

For Hurricane Irma updates, please CLICK HERE.

Keep following along with Chip & Co to stay up to date with all things Hurricane Irma!

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