Part of me thinks it might have just been an employee who didn't know what it was who asked a supervisor who didn't know what it was and they decided to take a look at it to make sure it wasn't something crazy left behind by a guest and decided to just get rid of it.
Another part of me thinks, it could have been so easily grabbed without employees noticing, but how could it be completely disassembled in that time, and then thrown in the trash when there is no trash cans on the entire route for TT? A guest would have had to get back on the tram, all the way up the hill, and then throw it away in Trama plaza without anyone stopping them.
IMO, kind of a failure in operations in both cases.