Disneyland guests stranded on sinking Pirates of the Caribbean ride: ‘Walk the plank’

A viral video has shown a group of Disneyland guests who were stranded in a sinking boat on the Pirates of the Caribbean attraction for an hour before firefighters came to the rescue.

The viral clip was shared on social media by TikTok user Justin, who goes by @justnjames_ on the app. Since it was posted earlier this week, the video has been viewed more than 1.5 million times.

In the video, a group of passengers on the Pirates of the Caribbean attraction at Disneyland sitting in boats that begin to fill with water.

“POV: You’re stuck on the pirates ride @ Disneyland and your boat is literally sinking,” wrote user Justin over the video. After an hour of sitting in the waterlogged boat, firefighters from the Disneyland Fire Department came to rescue the passengers from the sinking ride by having them walk a makeshift plank from the boat to the ground.

“Disney fire department had to come and rescue us,” he said. “After an hour of being stuck we finally got off.”

Justin captioned the TikTok, “It was a hot mess. Honestly thought we were gonna swim our way out of this,” and explained that the Disneyland guests were given vouchers to buy dry socks and allowed to skip lines at other rides.

“Y’all all they gave us was some $30 vouchers for socks and single lightning lanes,” he said.

Many people in the comments section were stunned by the shocking video, while others were simply amused that firefighters had passengers on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride walk a literal plank.

“Damn full experience of pirates they even made you walk the plank,” commented one viewer.

“Love this ride but this is my biggest fear,” said someone else.

The Pirates of the Caribbean ride is located in New Orleans Square at Disneyland Park in Anaheim, California. The attraction was originally designed by Walt Disney in the 1950s and opened to the public on 18 March, 1967. Since then, the immersive attraction has gone on to inspire the popular Disney film series starring Johnny Depp.

At the Disney World park in Orlando, Florida, the once-popular ride Splash Mountain closed last month after receiving much criticism for its “racist” connection to the 1946 film Song of the South.

Song of the South is considered one of Disney’s most controversial movies for its stereotypical representations of Black people and its romanticised depiction of the antebellum South during the Reconstruction Era.

Splash Mountain features the film’s animated characters Brer Rabbit, Brer Fox and Brer Bear, as well as the movie’s best-known song “Zip-a-dee-doo-dah”. In June 2020 – in the wake of the Black Lives Matter protests – Disney announced it will replace the Splash Mountain ride and will no longer play the song “Zip-a-dee-doo-dah” at its resorts.

The ride – which opened at Magic Kingdom in October 1992 – will be replaced by a new attraction called Tiana’s Bayou Adventure, based on the 2009 animated film The Princess and the Frog.

Tiana’s Bayou Adventure is prepared to launch in 2024.