Disneyland Explosion Causes Theme Park Evacuation, Culprit is Dry Ice Bomb
Families at Disneyland in Anaheim, Calif. got quite a scare Tuesday, as the Toontown section of the park was evacuated very abruptly. An explosion in one of the trash cans there caused Anaheim police to launch a full-scale investigation into the matter.
The explosion occurred around 5:30 p.m., and visitors in Toontown were quickly evacuated. No injuries were reported however, and the park was reopened a couple of hours later.
"Just a big boom and the trash can exploding ... the lid coming up ... people were at a standstill," Vanessa Vasquez told CNN affiliate KCBS. "It was kind of a little scary when I saw the whole area (look like a) ghost town."
The culprit appears to have been a simple dry ice 'bomb'. Though the bomb makes a loud noise, it is relatively harmless. It is made by placing chunks of dry ice into a plastic bottle and screwing on the cap as tightly as possible. Police report there have been a number of these bombs found in Anaheim within the past few months.
"In an abundance of caution, the area was evacuated," Disneyland said on its official Twitter account. "There were no injuries and no reported damage."
Despite the bomb's inability to do any real damage, park officials decided it would be best to let the police department investigate the loud noise. Other sections of the park remained open during that time.
"You wouldn't expect situations like that coming to a place like this. That is crazy, that's wild," said West Covina resident Jonathan Rosario. "It reminds us we all need to do our part to be safe."
While the park's evacuation was generally seen as a cautious move, some still believe it wasn't enough. Some park-goers are saying that it is prevention, not reaction, that Disneyland should be focusing on.
"It might be good to have more security in times like this," said Hugo Garcia, who was visiting with his family from Napa Valley. "We want Disneyland to keep its good reputation."
The Anaheim police department has said that they are reviewing park tapes as well as social media posts on Facebook and Twitter to gain an idea of who might have been responsible for the explosion. They claim that so far they have not generated any leads.
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