We get it. Disneyland is the ‘happiest place on Earth’. It means a great deal to many people. You may have even said, “I wish I could stay here forever!” at some point during a visit. But in case you meant that literally, and have written into your will that you want your relatives to stand up on the ‘It’s a Small World (After All)’ ride and fling your ashes into water (so that you can listen to that song on repeat for all eternity), you should probably reconsider. Because it turns out that Disney isn’t super cool with deceased people being at the park outside of the (fake) ones in the Haunted Mansion.
The Wall Street Journal reports that ash spreading is a common enough problem at Disneyland that the cleanup crew has a code word for it – HEPA. HEPA cleanup refers to a high-powered delicate vacuum filter that is specially designed to pick up small particles, and while it isn’t always used to pick up the small particles of a person’s ashes, it is often. Too often. They say it happens on a monthly basis at a minimum.
And apparently, no place at Disneyland is safe from the rampant ash-spreading. According to the custodial staff, human ash is EVERYWHERE. Think about that the next time you see a suspicious pile at Star Tours or it seems extra dusty on Pirates of the Carribean. Or don’t think about it. Can we not think about that?
As you might guess the Haunted Mansion is a hot target, with one custodian explaining, “The Haunted Mansion probably has so much human ash in it that it’s not even funny.” Yeah, I mean, funny actually wasn’t the word we were thinking of. Not okay? Creepy? Horrifying? We’ll keep thinking of some alternatives.
We understand that you want to honor the people you love by scattering them somewhere magical, and Disney gets that too. But inside rides at Disneyland is not a sanitary or safe place to do so. So, know that if you’re found with the remains of a loved one, you absolutely will be escorted out of the park. Think about it this way: Even if you get away with it initially — the ashes are just going to get vacuumed up and discarded into the trash eventually, and we doubt that is anyone’s intention for a peaceful final resting place.
