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Former Seaworld Orlando Employee Here

Discussion in 'New Member Introductions' started by sandra johnson, 12 Feb 2020.

  1. sandra johnson

    sandra johnson New Member

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    Hi all. I came across this website while searching for photos of the park. I am retired now but for nine years I worked in the Theming department at Seaworld in Orlando. It was my job to maintain and repaint the many graphics and murals as well as touch up every set/show in the park. Another of my jobs was fabricating and installing props. I have taken many photos of course but when my hard drive in my old computer crapped out I lost some pictures.
    One of the photos I lost was a boat I repainted and did a faux finish on. It was requested by someone at the Wild Arctic Exhibit. I have photos of the boat when I finished working on it though.
    I came across a photo of the boat this morning exactly where it was installed and I am happy to see that it's still there. A coworker and I hauled the boat over to the exhibit and a couple of employees there hoisted the boat up to the top of the 'rocks' upside down. My coworker and I had brought over a bucket of a material called Dryvit mixed with water and began throwing it up onto the boat to look like snow.
    Seaworld has made changes since I retired in early 2009 but it's nice to see some things are still there.
    I would also like to mention that the Theming department was responsible for ALL props everywhere in the park and we also had to repaint the 'snow' at Wild Arctic. The most frightening project was going into the Polar bear exhibit. Snow and Klondike and Johnny were the three bears there at the time and I know that two of them have passed away. :(
    When we went into the animal trainer area in the back we stood between two very thick stainless steel doors. The bears were behind these doors and could smell us. They were able to put their paws under the doors but they couldn't get out. They banged on the doors and snorted at us. It was chilling.
    We took our paints and made the 'snow' white again. Of course this never lasted very long. Lots of yellow 'snow'. Lol.
    I have posted the photo of my boat I found on this site and if I can, I will post the boat after I painted it and did a wood grain faux finish on it. wild arctic boat on rocks.JPG
     

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  2. Carl Jones

    Carl Jones Well-Known Member 5+ year member

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    Thanks Sandra for sharing this. I visited Seaworld Orlando a few years ago, I really enjoyed it although I had some reservations about some of the shows. However the level of training was impressive.
     
  3. Arizona Docent

    Arizona Docent Well-Known Member 15+ year member

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    Welcome to the site. Most members have never worked at a zoological facility (we are just fans) so it will be good to have input from an insider.
     
  4. birdsandbats

    birdsandbats Well-Known Member 5+ year member

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    Welcome!
     
  5. Crowthorne

    Crowthorne Moderator Staff Member 10+ year member

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  6. Hipporex

    Hipporex Well-Known Member 5+ year member

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    Welcome to Zoochat
     
  7. TheGerenuk

    TheGerenuk Well-Known Member 5+ year member

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    Welcome to ZooChat!