Tag: Hotel Safety
View All TagsHotel Safety / Hotel Woes / Hotel Doors / Hotel Security / Hotel Locks / Hotel Keycards / → All Tags
Dry Erase Markers Could Be Hazardous To Your Hotel Stay
Back in July, we wrote about how a certain Cody Brocious had figured out a way to pick the locks on any hotel room door manufactured by Onity. And since Onity has installed somewhere between four and five million hotel room doors all over the world, that was kind of worrying.
Now, Brocious' idea has been taken one step further by another dastardly hacker, this time by the name of Matthew Jakubowski. NBCNews reports that Jakubowski has managed to fit all the parts of the lock-picking device into a single dry erase marker.
What's more, he went and posted a YouTube video to show the marker in action, and even wrote out instructions on his blog, giving everyone and their mothers the means to assemble a lock-picking dry erase marker of their very own.
Hotel News / Hotel Woes / JW Marriott Hotels / Chicago Hotels / Hotel Pools / Hotel Safety / Hotel Tips / → All Tags
Legionnaires’ Disease Claims Three at JW Marriott Chicago
New this May, JW Marriott Chicago's chlorine-less pool touted a UV-light filtration process
Here’s what we know so far: an outbreak of Legionnaires' disease has been connected to 10 guests who visited or stayed at the JW Marriot Chicago between mid-July and mid-August. As of this past Friday, three of those guests died from the disease. The same strain of legionella bacteria found in the ill guests was also found in JW Marriott Chicago's pool, whirlpool, and decorative fountain in the main lobby, all of which have since been drained. The bacteria was also found in the men's and women's lockers rooms.
The Chicago Department of Public Health reported last week that the JW Marriott was fully cooperating with the ongoing investigation and had taken the recommended measures to reduce the risk of exposure. They now believe there is no ongoing health threat at the hotel.
It's heavy hotel news, but sadly, legionnaires' happens in the hotel (hot-tubing, cruise-shipping and hospital-going) world. Last year alone, it sickened two guests and claimed the life of another at Luxor, and sickened six at Aria, both in Vegas.
Essentially a severe pneumonia, legionnaires’ is caused by high concentrations of legionella bacteria that show up in water. It can survive for many months in that wet environment, especially in warm water. Transmission isn’t totally understood, but the gist of it is that it’s not spread by person-to-person contact but by inhaling or ingesting the legionella microbes (read: drinking the water, breathing in the vapor above and around the water). Once contracted, legionnaires’ can take anywhere from two to eight days to show up.
Deep in the hotel trenches, we also know that the new-in-May pool at JW Marriott was very unique in its UV filtration process—an important fact absent from the majority of news on the outbreak. Dubbed a high-tech pool by the hotel, the 11.2 meter chlorine-less pool was instead filtered by UV-light. According to the hotel’s original press release on the pool, “the water flows through UV-light chambers to eliminate 99% of all toxins and bacteria resulting in less chlorine in the pool than in average drinking water.” The release continues, “The absence of chlorine eliminates allergies and irritations and offers the feeling of swimming in a fresh water lake.”
Hotel Security / Hotel Safety / Hotel Locks / Hotel Doors / Hotel Keycards / → All Tags
Here's Yet Another Way for Thieves to Break Into Your Hotel Room
It seems like once a year we hear about some nefarious new way for thieves to break into hotel rooms using both sophisticated and not-so-sophisticated gadgets to do so. (Metal hangers anyone?)
This year's hack comes courtesy of a software developer and security researcher named Cody Brocious who recently told Forbes.com that his less than $50 invention can break the locks installed on hotel room doors by lock manufacturer, Onity. Onity has done about four and five million hotel room doors around the world. Yikes, right? However, don't write off staying in hotels forever just yet.
Hotel Openings / Conrad Hotels / Manhattan Hotels / Hotel Safety / Hotel Security / Hotel Amenities / → All Tags
Conrad New York, Opening March 19, Touts 'For Your Confidence' Safety and Security Amenities
We've gone back and forth with the Conrad New York over opening dates quite a few times but now it looks like the hotel's March 19 opening date is sticking.
We found rooms for Monday night (yes, this Monday!) at a whopping $479 a night for a king superior suite with a river view. (Remember, all rooms are suites here.) Rates for $499 a night include breakfast. Not feeling that flush? You can book a room with double beds for slightly less at $439 a night.
While we're loving the extensive list of room perks that include our fave techie goodies like flat-screeen TVs, espresso machines, sleeper sofas and even an art brochure that details all the art throughout the hotel, we're also impressed with the hotel's For Your Confidence list of security and safety features like automatic door closers, controlled access corridors, double-locking doors, emergency call buttons on the phone and wide angle door viewers.
We're not saying you should leave your expensive jewelry, watches and handbags out in plain sight but all these safety features should make you relax a little in the "big bad city."
Celebrity Scoop / Hotel Safety / Hotel Theft / Marriott Hotels / Georgia Hotels / → All Tags
Another Ring Goes Missing on the Hotel Nightstand...
It turns out aging boy banders are just like us! They, too, have stuff, allegedly, stolen from their hotel rooms.
In the case of Brian Littrell of the Backstreet Boys, he claims his wife's $110,000 wedding ring was stolen off the nightstand of the Evergreen Marriott Resort at Stone Mountain in Georgia over the weekend:
He said after they checked out and were leaving the park, his wife, Leighanne, realized she didn't have any of her jewelry. The couple immediately returned to the hotel, but said by the time they got to the room, all $120,000 worth of jewelry was missing.
"It was just kind of weird how it happened and how fast," Brian Littrell said. "I kept my rings on the bedside table, we left the room and 15 minutes I came back , they're gone." Leighanne Littrell said.
What Is This / Hotel Furniture / Hotel Views / Omni Hotels / Manhattan Hotels / Hotel Windows / Hotel Safety / → All Tags
What Is This At The Omni Berkshire Place?
We like to keep it fun but informative here at HotelChatter so our newest series, What is This? is devoted to odd-looking items in hotel rooms that upon first glance look as if they serve only a decorative purpose. But everything happens for a reason, right? And we're here to tell you what these things really do.
It took us a while to figure out what the heck this miniature doodad was, though several factors in the room (a malfunctioning safe, for one) distracted us from the mystery at hand. And anyway, the Omni Berkshire Place is a pretty classy joint, so we weren't about to throw a tantrum when we had delicious cocktails and pink-accented bathrooms to enjoy.
But it turns out it's not so much what this thing does than what it stops from happening.
Too cryptic? Click below to see what we mean.
Hotel Safety / Hotel Rooftops / Hotel Windows / Hotel Emergencies / → All Tags
Hotel Safety 101: What to Check Out After You Check In
Hotels. Gravity. There's no reason they have to be in opposition. So far this summer, we've seen one too many tragedies unfold on the wrong side of a hotel balcony—or window. So maybe it's time we go back to basics and lay down some travel safety rules.
· Keep off the heavy drinking at rooftop bars
It's a terrible way to bring a night of fresh-air fun to an abrupt and unsavory end. When you find yourselves drinking al fresco, it may be a good idea to save the heavy drinking for later, when you find yourself back on dry land. One Manhattan-based GM tells us: "On busier evenings, we do have security on the roof to watch for unruly behavior as well as employees and managers keeping their eyes out for any such occurrence."
Hotel Safety / W Hotels / Hotel Windows / Austin Hotels / Hotel News / → All Tags
What is Wrong With The W's Windows?
UPDATE, 3:42PM: W Hotels has released this statement on the two incidents. The W Austin and W Atlanta Midtown incidents are completely unrelated.
The circumstances of the two incidents are quite different and they are totally unrelated. At the W Austin, a panel of glass broke on balcony railings on two unoccupied condo residences located above the hotel. As such, these are two completely separate incidents, at two very different types of buildings and locations (balcony railing versus window).
Teams of experts are currently investigating each event independently.
We thought last month's horror hotel story about the two women falling through a guestroom window at the W Atlanta was bad enough but it's happened again! there's been another scary incident involving glass at a W Hotel. This time, at the new W Austin in Texas.
Bed Bugs / Hotel Safety / Hotel Health / EcoSmart / Hotel News / → All Tags
EcoSmart Bed Bug Repellent Won't Let the Bed Bugs Bite
Bed bugs are a hotel guest's worst nightmare. But there's not much you can do about them since they are so hard to see and it's only when you've returned home from a trip that the telltale red bumps start to invade your skin.
And not even avoiding skanky budget hotels will protect you as luxury hotels have been known to be infested too.
But now there's a product out there that claims it can keep bed bugs from getting into your suitcase EcoSmart Bed Bug Travel Repellent uses botanical ingredients to "erect a barrier around [a] suitcase and other areas so bed bugs, if they're lurking can’t hitch a ride home."
And if you're staying in hotel rooms, you can spray EcoSmart around the headboard of the bed and the mattress area to keep the bed bugs from biting in your sleep. You can even spray EcoSmart in your home if you think the bed bugs may have followed you there.
Hotel Safety / Hotel Locks / B Hotels / → All Tags
We've Never Seen a Door Latch Like This Before
When we turn out the light for the night in our hotel room, there's one thing we always do--and that's slide the safety latch above the door lock into place.
Sure, a determined thief could use a special tool to dismantle the latch but we still feel safer doing it.
Usually, the safety latch is a chain link with a nobbin on the end of it that you insert into another piece on the door. When the door opens, it immediately gets caught by the latch. (OMG we totally just tried to explain how a safety latch works.)
Anyways, most hotels have that chain link but at the new B Ocean Hotel in Fort Lauderdale (Guess the Hotel revealed!), we spotted a new sexier kind of door latch.
Econolodges / Orlando Hotels / Hotel Safety / Choice Hotels / Hotel News / → All Tags
Having an 'Undercover Boss' Still Didn't Help the Econolodge in Orlando
Fortunately, this story has a happy ending but it doesn't change the fact that a 16-month old girl slipped and fell from the balcony of the Econolodge in Orlando, one of the biggest Econolodges in the world and also the same miserable property that got poor marks during the Undercover Boss episode back in September.
Miraculously, the toddler was saved by a British tourist who noticed the baby hanging from the fourth-floor railing and ran to catch her before she hit the ground. The girl hit a third-floor railing on the way down but didn't even suffer a bruise or scratch and was even described as happy afterward.
Hotel Safety / Milan Hotels / Crowne Plaza Hotels / → All Tags
The Crowne Plaza Milan Shares Its Street Smarts
You're in a foreign city and you've spent at least half the day traveling and you just want to sit down inside your hotel room and maybe flip open your laptop and update your Facebook status. But then...something catches your eye. It's a little sign that notes good safety precautions inside the hotel, like keeping valuables in the safe and always checking the peephole before opening your room door. But wait! It continues on to advise on proper safety outside the hotel—street smarts, if you will.
The sign above is such, and we discovered it on the desk of our room recently. Why the Crowne Plaza Milan? Well, it's a future feature in our Adventures in Blind Booking series, and it's centrally located...right in the vicinity of Milan's Stazione Centrale. Aka the domain of clueless tourists, pickpockets, rushing businessmen and other transients. Not the best place to be careless with your belongings, right? Right.
