Most four-year-olds are perfectly capable of saying, "I feel sick." I'm betting the child was fine before being stricken.

The later reports say the child probably had a sudden seizure that might have happened if he'd been sitting on a park bench.

The parents are blameless in this. It's just one of those terrible tragedies that happen all the time. And it has nothing to do with elderly people getting chest pains on the ride. Lots of elderly get chest pains sitting on the beach.

The unknown health problems can flare up even with semmingly healthy adults. I had a clerk working for me, in her late 50s and what we would think of as slender. She went on a ride of some sort, (a roller coaster, I think) and broke several ribs and cracked her spine. It seems that she had serious osteoporosis that had never given her much trouble, but the force of the ride was enough to break the fragile bones.
It's just one those freaky things that happen.

2Gs? It sure felt like a heck of a lot more than that when I rode it. Sad for the family. Sounds like the ride exacerbated some undiagnosed underlying condition.

It's a fun ride all the same, and riddled with warnings.

According to CNN the autopsy didn't find anything. No trauma to the body at all. They still aren't sure what happened.

There is such a huge competition at theme parks. Bigger, faster, scary rides. It's all in competeting for those dollars. I have wondered about Disney sometimes having those type of rides when the park really is promoted as family including very small children. I know they are trying to have something for everyone, warnings etc. but I wonder if rides of that intensity are really appropriate for Disney Land or World. It's a tough call I guess. It's a sad thing in any case.

My heart goes out to these parents who thought it would be safe for their little one to accompany them on this ride and made the fateful decision. I have visions of the little guy pleading to go on saying he was big/old enough! I can remember getting out of the line for Space Mountain when I read the blurb about "if you have a heart condition..." I thought no way, since I am too much of a coward to do anything daring enough to warrant a heart condition warning. This poor little guy prob. did have some unknown pre-existing heart or brain condition that got 'disturbed' by the force of the ride. Live and learn, I guess. How tragic.

All the articles on this are hyping the "2 G's" of force, but that's really not as intense as it sounds. A carnival Gravitron pulls more G's than that, and Disney's Rock 'n' Rollercoaster tops at around 5 G's during the launch. So, Mission to Mars isn't by any means the most intense ride at WDW in terms of gravitational force on the body.

I agree with the posters who think an underlying medical condition is to blame -- not the ride, and certainly not the parents.

DH, a medic, speculates that he could have died of a form of shock, if the force was enough to reduce his blood pressure to nearly nothing (e.g., force all the blood to extremities) -- a possibility with a small child and extreme force -- in addition to possibilities of undiscovered problem.

Issue re: height -- if he hadn't been tall enough to be secured in his seat, wouldn't the cause of death have been rather obviously trauma from falling out or being knocked around? Anyone seen any updates on this?

Out of respect for the family, lets stop speculating and respect their privacy and accept that accidents do happen. An autopsy will determine the cause.

Agree it is just terrible for Parents - whatever the cause.

One of the reasons people speculate on things like this (and gawk at accidents, etc.) is so they can feel immune to random accidents that may happen - if they don't participate in whatever activity caused the tragedy, then they themselves are "safe"