Disney World Cancels Fireworks Show Due To Tropical Storm Elsa

Disney World has canceled its "EPCOT Forever" fireworks show, due to tropical storm Elsa. Elsa is still on track to hit Florida, with the effects of the storm expected to start showing tonight and tomorrow. The Disney Experience app has updated its schedule to show that as of today, the EPCOT fireworks are canceled; however, it looks like as of now, Disney has them scheduled to return tomorrow. As of writing this, the "Happily Ever After" fireworks show at Magic Kingdom is still scheduled to take place tonight and every day after, as scheduled.

Of course, all of this must be taken with a grain of salt, as tropical storm Elsa could intensify and force Disney World to revise all of its current scheduling for fireworks shows. There's already speculation that aspects of the "Happily Ever After" show will have to be modified, due to the weather.

Disney World is in a state of significant change at the moment both because of the COVID-19 pandemic and the cultural changes that occurred in and around the time of the pandemic. In fact, Disney World's fireworks show just made headlines for the choice to rewrite the opening greeting of "Happily Ever After" from "Ladies and Gentlemen, Boys and Girls!" to "Good evening, dreamers of all ages!"

That same drive for better cultural awareness and inclusivity has extended to many other attractions in the park. Jungle Cruise is being revamped in order to get rid of some culturally insensitive depictions of native peoples; Splash Moutain's ode to Disney's controversial Songs of the South film was thrown out and replaced by a new theme based on The Princess and the Frog.

In addition to cultural updates, the COVID-19 pandemic has also forced Disney to make fundamental sanitary and procedural changes to how its theme parks operate, based on the pandemic and all the health concerns it brought to light. Disney Parks head Josh D'Amaro issued this statement, regarding such updates to the parks during COVID:

"We are in a new normal right now, so what's happening outside of the gates of Walt Disney World is our new world," D'Amaro said. "I think you know we were one of the first theme parks to close, and we'll be about the last to open. And we spent every minute of every day thinking about how to operate in this new normal that we're in."

Check the My Disney app to keep up with the latest changes to the schedule, due to tropical storm Elsa.