Surviving Spouse From Disney Tragedy Released

A Washington state woman who was injured in a Christmas Eve accident at Disneyland that also killed her husband was released Saturday from UCI Medical Center.

Hospital officials said Lieu Thuy Vuong, 43, was in good condition when she left sometime in the afternoon. She underwent minor reconstructive surgery on the right side of her face while she was hospitalized.

She and her husband, Luan Phi Dawson, were visiting from Duvall, Wash., and had taken their son and grandson to the Anaheim amusement park. There, an 8-pound metal cleat on the tall ship Columbia, one of Disneyland’s oldest attractions, snapped loose under rope tension as the ship neared the dock. The cleat flew into a crowd of visitors, striking Vuong and her husband.

An autopsy report said Dawson, 33, died Dec. 26 of a brain hemorrhage and a skull fracture. A private memorial service for Dawson was delayed until after Vuong’s hospital release and now is planned for “some time in the future,” according to a hospital statement.

Although the coroner’s office did not investigate how the accident happened, the autopsy report gave the first official account of events leading up to the tragedy. It said the Disneyland worker responsible for securing the ship to the dock didn’t realize how fast the vessel was approaching and tried to secure the boat to the dock anyway. The employee suffered a serious foot injury.

Proper procedure, according to the autopsy report, is to allow the ship to “overshoot the dock, and then reverse” gently into position there.