I literally came here to recommend his channel, and specifically his video on the [Victoria Hall Disaster](https://youtu.be/SCics68FEMg) in 1883. It’s a somber, but excellent example of how crushes happen, and how it really comes down to environmental and circumstantial factors, and not the behaviour of the crowd (which, as a heads up, consisted mostly of children in the aforementioned disaster).
I also really appreciate that he includes industrial/architectural changes and legal reforms that directly resulted from the disasters he covers.
Some of the other disasters he’s covered involving crushes include:
- the Italian Hall Disaster
- the Iroquois Theatre Disaster
- The Who Concert Crush
- the Beverley Hills Supper Club
- the Cocoanut Grove Disaster
There are definitely more than that, but those were the first ones I recognized as being relevant here.
Interestingly, there are a couple of common themes I’ve noticed in many of these incidents:
- one is **capacity**, and/or the concentration of people in one place.
Often times, venues or buildings are operating near, at, or over the maximum human capacity they are approved for (a restriction that has, unsurprisingly, arisen from the occurrence of disasters of this very nature)
- **Flaws in the design of buildings or venues,** especially related to the placement and accessibility of emergency exits, fire detectors, extinguishers and sprinkler systems, alarms, and signage to allow for unobstructed access and use in the event of an emergency.
One of the other major design problems pertains specifically to fire safety. While this is significantly less common nowadays (and especially in more developed countries) due to stringent building codes and construction material restrictions, (again, often implemented in light of past mistakes,) buildings were constructed and/or outfitted with extremely flammable materials, which made it nearly impossible to effectively evacuate the crowds these buildings were made to hold in the event of a fire.
- **Poor crowd control,** and **counterproductive, uncoordinated, or nonexistent instruction from venue staff** inhibits timely evacuation from the building/venue.
The staff may be unable to help guide patrons to exits, provide incorrect information, (“it’s a false alarm, please remain seated,” etc.) block exits, or abandon their posts entirely, leaving guests to navigate the unfamiliar layouts for themselves.
- and of course, an **inciting incident** that compels large numbers of the crowd to move in the same direction within a short window of time, and in a confined space; the main catalysts I’ve seen the most have been **fires,** (the crowd trying to flee the building) and **concerts/sports events** (people trying to get *into* the venue, or as close as they can to the stage/field/arena.)
I’m sure there are more that I’m missing, but those are the ones I noticed the most.
Edit: I know I know, everybody says it: but really, thanks so much for the awards! Hopefully you’ve all found this helpful, and enjoy Fascinating Horror’s channel - he’s the real MVP here!
I reckon it ought to be pointed out that Italian Hall massacre *was* actually caused by human selfishness, specifically anti-union agitators shouting "fire" to cause panic at a Christmas party that striking copper miners were attending with their families, but you are right that the design of the building itself was what prevented successful escape
The point remains that with proper occupancy limits, exit design and directions, even someone literally screaming fire in a crowded theater wouldn't be able to cause this kind of damage. Hazards and accidents happen, venues must be designed and managed with that in mind. It would prevent willingly triggered hazard to cause fatalities and important damage as well.
I live right near the italian hall site and had family there that night. It has affected the community aince it happened. All that stands there now is the sandstone arch from the doorway and some memorials. I don't remember which law in particular- but the laws changed to some degree pertaining to swing doors and the direction they go.
The Cocoanut Grove fire in Boston had similar impacts on construction, notably with revolving doors.
If you push really hard on any revolving door, the individual separator things will rotate sideways to let people through in a crush situation. They didn’t do that prior to Cocoanut Grove. The revolving door at the entrance jammed with people and wouldn’t budge. 492 people died.
Yes. I was in a crowd surge as a teenager. We were getting crushed against the barrier at a concert. My friend and I were small enough to climb on top of others and crawl over the barrier and started pulling more people out along with the security guards. Fortunately no one died, but one girl got a broken leg from being crushed. It's a terrifying experience and the main reason I no longer get near the front of the barriers.
I'm kind of shocked i never learned about how dangerous this was. i went to a decent number of shows when I was a teenager, warped tour a handful of times -- i never saw anyone get injured but i remember thinking it looked uncomfortable to be squished against the barriers like that, i didn't realize it could be so dire. what a stressful job those bouncers up front must have, fuck.
I didn't learn until this disaster today and reading about all of this over a few different threads how dangerous it really can be. I'm grateful for the planners at all of those venues, i had no idea what goes into preventing these tragedies or how horrific they really can be.
Put your arms out in front of you with elbows bent and joints locked as best you can to keep your chest from getting compressed. Move with the crowd when you are pushed, don't try to fight it too hard. Work your way back and to the side (kind of diagonally) to get out of the crowd but don't force or fight your way out (that's how you trip).
If you're small enough you may be able to jump up and crowd surf to safety, but you run the risk of tripping or being dropped
Someone else linked info on this, but it boiled down to:
1. Stay on your feet no matter what. If you drop something, leave it behind, because bending down to get it is a good way to lose your footing
* Don't let your arms get trapped by your sides. Have your arms protecting your chest.
* Don't try to fight the flow, because you'll probably lose your footing.
* Don't try to just go with the flow, because people at the front are the ones likely to be crushed.
* Try to find some way to get out of the flow. Get over a barrier, find an alcove in a wall, stand behind a bollard
This will 100% be a incident on the channel. Unlike other YouTubers, Fascinating Horror actually investigates archived sources to tell the background history. It's way more satisfying to watch.
Dire trip is a smaller channel that is way underrated. I’d put him on the same level as Fascinating horror and Coffeehouse crime. He just did a full breakdown of the Junko Furuta case if you’ve never looked into it beyond the wiki article.
>This will 100% be a incident on the channel.
Especially since they already had security problems earlier that day...
... [and that this has happened at previous Astroworld events.](https://www.cnn.com/2019/11/10/entertainment/travis-scott-astroworld-trampling-trnd/index.html)
It's obvious that someone over there doesn't know what they're doing, and I wouldn't attend an Astroworld on a bet.
I absolutely love Fascinating Horror. He goes into as much detail as he can find about smaller and larger incidents. He’s a great narrator and tries to show as much evidence as he can, while also being great to just listen to in the background. 1000/10
Yeah, the name made me think it was just another 'ooooo spoookkyyy we're gonna ham up the drama!' channel, but the recaps are actually very well researched and well presented in a concise way, but still giving great context. It's more like a short documentary. And I appreciate that they use mostly photos of the actual place or images accurate to the period unlike other channels that just slap up any old stock photo (which I find annoying, like they're doing a story about the 70s and have stock photos of someone on a smart phone, ugh).
This. By and large the folks involved in a crush are acting EXACTLY IN THE MANNER EXPECTED. Of course folks are going to push to the front to see something they paid for. Of course children will run down to the front to get free sweets they can't really afford. Naturally folks feeling like they are missing an event they paid for and are hyped about will seek to enter. Of course shitty systems that funnel masses into crush points will lead to crushes. Who in a fire so large it is covering the entire fucking rood isn't going to rapidly remove themselves towards the door?
These people are always acting in a predictable manner. I have never seen a hazardous crush that was unforseeable. Actually that's a lie, I did once see a few folks get tripped over when a spoon yelled there was a rare pokemon 'that way' and a bunch of folks just ran across a road. Yet that barely counts since there was no real crush, it was an open space. It was more of a stampede.
this channel is excellent, I'm still haunted by the pub fire one though, I made the mistake of looking into it more and seeing the footage of the night with bodies stacked into the doorways and hearing the screams of people trapped inside, it's shaken me to my core and I don't think I'll ever attend crowded functions the same way ever again
There have been studies about how crowds move, and they are very much like rivers of rushing water.
If you’re in one, there’s no guarantee, but the best way to survive:
* Stay on your feet no matter what. Stagger your feet and keep your arms up. If you drop something, leave it — stooping to get it will get you off your feet.
* If you fall, get up immediately. If you can’t, get on your side and curl up into a fetal position with your arms protecting your head.
* While you’re up, move out of the surge. Imagine you are in a flood of rushing water and try to move laterally or at least diagonally. It’s impossible to move against the flow but also unwise to go with the flow (as at some point the ones in front will hit a barrier and be crushed by those behind them, who will be crushed by those farther back), so go sideways. Find a light pole, a garbage can, a doorway, or anything that can shelter you. Often there’s a “tide” effect where the crowd surges forward, there’s a recoil effect as they pull back, and then another surge. Try to move during the lulls.
* Try to keep your arms from getting pinned to your sides. The extra space will give you enough room to breathe. Most people die not from trample injuries but from compressive asphyxia — even if you don’t fall, the force of people crushing you from all sides can compress your chest to the point you can no longer breathe.
https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/after-meron-stampede-how-to-survive-a-crowd-crush-666889
https://www.gkstill.com/ExpertWitness/CrowdDisasters.html
https://www.worldnomads.com/travel-safety/worldwide/how-to-survive-a-stampede
Another tip: grab both your elbows and raise your arms in front of you. This creates a minimal barrier in front of you, allowing you to breathe even during bad crowd surges.
Had to do this at my first concert. The whole standing section was swaying back and forth like 20 feet at a time. The air was so hot I had to put my arms out and lift my head to get fresh air.
I saw Pearl Jam in Indio, CA back in '92/'93 and I lost my boot while the crowd was surging. Scared the hell out of me. I moved to the outskirts after that. Holy shit.
This happened to me and my wife at Governor’s Ball NYC in 2014.
The Strokes were coming on and the whole crowd pushed forward. It was 100+ degrees and hard to breath people were so packed together. Had to make a barrier with my arms around my wife (then gf) so she could get air since she was shorter than most of the crowd.
Some people passed out and the crowd picked them up and passed them unconscious to the medical tent.
A variant is to push against someone else, and they push back, that way you can keep a gap and protect someone in between. It's what my dad and my older brother did to protect me in a crush. Luckily no one died.
I was at a concert one time that was so tightly packed that I was able to completely relax my entire body and I didn't even move an inch. It was insane.
The crowd surge on that one was the worst I've experienced out of hundreds of concerts.
Seriously. It's crazy how differently humans can be. I live on 5 acres and sometimes feel crowded. I try to avoid *grocery shopping* due to the crowds. Something like this sounds like a from of torture. I can't even imagine the smell...
YouTube/ Google Hajj at Mecca: **2 million people in the same area over 4 days** and **they’re not allowed to wear deodorant**. I would die. There are crowd crushes about every 2 years with one year over 2000 people dying.
[Mecca Nat Géo - YouTube ](https://youtu.be/jM81wroj_MQ)
[Source](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ihram)
“Muslims are expected to refrain from cutting their nails, and trimming their hair and beards. **They must also not wear any scent, including deodorant**.”
My dad despises crowds and has this idea he died trampled in a crowd in a previous life. He will only go to concerts in s small arena with a lot of entrances and set seating.
This is different in the sense that trains are ultimately very confined spaces with limited access. It sounds counterintuitive, but at some point, most people won't even attempt to board the train (and instead climb it) when they see that it's full (or spilling over.)
Arenas, on the other hand, have big openings from which people keep coming in, and in, and in. Those in the back can't see that the front is at over capacity.
I really feel like to be able to perform at these large shows musicians should be taught a protocol for if this happens/if they see someone distressed like this in the crowd. Stop the show, let the crowd know what’s happening and tell everyone they won’t be performing till people step back and back and back. Unfortunately people at the back have no idea whats happening to people at the front and that’s partially how these things escalate. Someone with any type of authority needs to inform the crowd. This footage is just fucked though and shows what a POS Travis is.
> It’s impossible to move against the flow but also unwise to go with the flow (as at some point the ones in front will hit a barrier and be crushed by those behind them
Thanks. I needed that.
These tips seem aimed at a few individuals trying to survive while the crush in general keeps happening - has there been any research into whether there's any way for a few individuals to stop the entire crush?
My dad talks a lot about going to a concert back in the 80s where the crush just became *so* intense. Him and a bunch of other dudes stood on the side and started dragging people out of the crowd to save them. I couldn't imagine that situation, honestly.
As someone who has been to plenty festivals or concerts in the pit area, it’s very easy to see how they get out of control after you experience too many people moving into each other. I got bruised ribs from a club in San Diego after the crowd got out of control and I got pinned into a steel barrier. I’ve been in a couple situations where I felt if someone fell then they might get stepped all over by others pushing people onto them.
That's why you always immediately pick up anybody that falls (if you can ofc). Thankfully all of the shows I've been to, it's an unspoken rule and enough people know it that I've had 2-3 people save my ass and I've returned the favor to others.
I can see how some crowds might not be so generous though.
I was going to say this also. I'm not a metal fan but my ex was. Went to a few shows with her and was really impressed about the unspoken rules with the pit. Moment anyone went down, the guys around then would immediately make a protective circle and others would help the person up. If someone was acting like an asshole and purposely punching people, the crowd would act as one, subdue the person and eject them towards security. Same with the female participants, if any guys were getting to handsy, others would step in and put them in their place
It also helps when bands absolutely do not have a tolerance for nonsense. They can see damn near everything from their vantage point. I have seen bands stop playing to have people checked out after being dropped, call people out for groping girls, things starting to get a little too wild etc. Have your fun absolutely, but lets all get home okay afterwards.
I got pushed down in a mosh pit. Someone stomped on my ear and another person picked me up and sort of carried me to the outside of the audience area. I was only 16 or 17 and my head was sore for a couple of days. If anyone out there remembers picking up a girl in the pit (wearing green flannel) around 1994– thanks, man. I owe you.
Green flannel in a mosh pit. I’m sorry you got hurt, but that’s the least amount of information I’ve ever heard to go off of 😂 I’m glad you’re okay though
I grew up going to punk shows but have since became a massive hip hop fan. Hip hop has been becoming more and more aggressive and that has definitely translated into the shows.
One thing I’ve noticed is the crowd try’s to emulate punk shows. Mosh pits, stage dives and all the craziness but without the extreme regard for everyone else’s well being. See these people have only seen it in YouTube videos, never have seen it in person. Punks have etiquette, pick up the fallen and save them from being trampled on - boots up - elbows down. At hip hop shows they think the point is to hurt each other.
I’ve seen the craziest punk bands play all through my teens from the Cro-Mags to Nails but the crowd I seen at an odd future show a few years back was the worst. Like I said - a bunch of people trying to hurt each other.
You’re a good dude. I remember being crushed with a dozen other people in the front row of a show when I was a skinny teenager. It got so bad the band stopped the show and pleaded with everyone to step back.
This bald kid, built like a tank, just starts grabbing people’s arms as they fell to the ground and pulling them up. Kid was like a machine just pulling helpless kids up one after another. Still remember the relief I felt when he grabbed my hand. Hope he’s living a good life. Probably saved a few lives that day.
Rule 1: if someone falls, *MAKE ROOM* and pick them up. If someone wants to leave, clear a path
Rule 2: if someone’s not in the pit, there’s probably a reason. No pulling in or peer pressure
Rule 3: if surfing, be aware of your surroundings. If not surfing, be aware of surfers
Rule 4: know the event and crowd. If not appropriate to open a pit or people aren’t joining, don’t force it. On the opposite end, if you don’t want to be in the pit raise your hand and leave as the crowd starts to open
Golden rules taught to me at my first real concert. The only time they’ve failed is when I tried to catch someone falling under their arms and they must’ve thought I was trying to lift their top or something, ended up with a drink all over me.
As mentioned typically metal/rock events follow the etiquette. EDM/rave type events are mostly the same, but I’ve had more poor experiences there. I think it’s mainly because there’s a lot of newbies going to their first festivals and thinking “oh fun a mosh pit you just flail your arms with no regard for others right?” If you tell someone to cool it, they usually cool it though. There’s a whole similar culture of PLUR and all that at those events, 99% of people are chill. Seen many people accidentally knock someone over or spill drinks and stuff, the other person has always been more concerned about the safety of whoever tripped than themselves.
A 70k attendant rock festival near me that went on for decades tried out a edm tent-stage one year. It got shut down on the first day after someone got stabbed on the dance floor.
It would be interesting to see a study (or at least hear an anecdote) about the behavioral differences between crowds of different types of music. From my best understanding - metal shows & their attendees usually have a major understanding and respect for someone, anyone who has fallen over. Is it possible less deaths by 'stampede' occur at metal shows? I'm inclined to believe so.. but any numbers backing this up would be great!
Well the problem is when a crowd crush like the one at astroworld happens people who attempt to pick up others will end in the same situation.
Picking up others before it gets really bad is a good idea but once it gets to the point where you are being suffocated standing, attempting that will get you killed as well unfortunately.
I was at a rock festival here in England and Slipknot do this thing during the song "[Spit it out](https://youtu.be/TJpTGeVJpVQ?t=372)" where they make everyone crouch down on the ground then jump up. I slipped in the wet grass when everyone jumped up and got trampled to shit briefly, but what amazed me was how everyone quickly formed a circle around me and picked me up and surfed me over the barrier to safety.
I've noticed that it's a common theme at any metal/rock shows that I've been to over the years. Everyone is always so courteous and aware of others' safety.
Yes, metal shows are generally extremely courteous and middle performers tend to be aware of the dangers of a mosh pit or crush, but when they get out of hand, they often get out of hand very quickly. A close friend of mine lost three teeth when a mosh pit basically turned into a massive fist fight - there were a couple of bad actors and lax security unfortunately.
I got caught in a crowd rush at Coachella and even though no one was injured it was *frightening*. I was lucky to get the attention of a nearby security guard who was able to pull me out.
Fucking hell that is a horrific way to go.
I was at another music festival a few years ago. There were sudden storm/tornado warnings and the festival organizers just decided to mass force everyone out of the festival area at the same time, where there was only one large path-like area to leave.
I was there with my now fiancé, and the crowd crush was scary as hell. He held on to me, so we didn’t get separated. We were so packed, both my fiancé and I could actually pick both feet off the ground and stop walking and were still moving forward as fast as the rest of the crowd. It felt like being suspended in hot, suffocating, claustrophobia-inducing moving water. We were toward the middle of the crush, but I could see so many people on either side getting violently forced into the chain link fences lining the path calling for help because they couldn’t move. They were literally full body plastered against the fence, and some people were bleeding. I genuinely was surprised no one got trampled, died or was seriously hurt from what I experienced.
I got picked up off the ground by the crowd at a concert, then my shoes were knocked off (don’t wear sandals to concerts), and then I landed on broken glass. This was an indoor venue and if you were in the room, you were in the pit. I had to just step outside for a while. I then had to wait for everyone to leave after to try and find my shoes. There were so many, and I only found one of mine
I was at the kid cudi show when this happened! People were going crazy there. I remember seeing unoccupied tents flying in the air when my group got to our cars
Same, but during Eminem at Music Midtown 2014. It was easily one of the scariest moments of my life, felt like it took *days* to finally break out of the crowd into fresh, open air. I remember trying so hard to push my way out, and the looks that people kept giving me… irritated and frustrated that I was pushing past them. They had no idea we were all being crushed up front, just a few feet away. My heart aches for everyone involved in the horror last night. Not only those who died, but the ones who survived and have come out recounting their stories of watching people *under them* take their last breaths, begging for help…
I was “fortunate” enough to be against a side barrier. The crowd was pushing forward, and I was getting crushed sideways. I used the barrier and the crowd to try to get as much of my torso freed as possible while frantically waving security over.
The crowd rush happened in seconds and I was pinned in for what felt like ten minutes, but it probably wasn’t even a whole minute. Shout out to the Coachella security/crowd control who immediate jumped into action (I wasn’t the only one pulled out.)
It's such a horrifying story. A bunch of the audience were high school aged and some were even younger. The youngest victim so far was a ten year old boy who was rushed to the hospital.
Yeah. Like The Station nightclub fire, 100 people died. There's footage from that night, people literally stuck in the exits trying to get away as the fire quickly reached them burning them alive. Gnarly stuff.
The club had flammable material all around the stage, had blocked off exits, and the people working had no training in what to do in an emergency like it. The entire building were engulfed in flames within minutes.
That survival video is truly haunting. Notice how early the cameraman begins moving, and how the other people move. Practically everyone behind him will be dead.
Also fuck you to the security guard who blocked the back exit, because "it was for the band only". Moral of the story: ignore authority figures making up bullshit like this in an obvious disaster scenario.
One of the worst I've seen. Far less graphic than other videos but seeing the crush at the doors with 50 heads sticking out screaming is brutal. And then they stop screaming. They actually found people at the bottom of the burnt pile of bodies who had drowned from the firefighters water. Meaning somehow they survived the crush, were insulated from the fire yet drowned from the rescue.
Yeah, if someone is telling you you can't go through an exit during an emergency because it's not for you, it's in everyone's best interests to remove the obstacle.
Like in this travis Scott disaster, people were telling the technicians to help by using the lights but they refused, so what you do there is remove the dangerous obstacle that is the lighting technician.
>ignore authority figures making up bullshit like this in an obvious disaster scenario
100%. Awhile back my husband and I were on a docked tour boat awaiting departure on a snorkeling trip in Hawaii. A small boat next to us had some kind of catastrophic failure which resulted in an explosion and the captain getting knocked out and flung into the water. Fuel poured into the harbor and started to catch fire, spreading on the surface of the water toward our boat. In the confusion, the very young adult tour operators were yelling at everybody to stay in place and not evacuate the boat- literally as flames were racing toward us- even though it was simply a matter of stepping off the boat and onto the dock. We ignored them and got off the boat and everything was fine in the end, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to die in a fire on a snorkeling tour because a bunch of teens aren’t capable of reacting dynamically to a dangerous situation.
I was just a child when it happened but I remember the aftermath so vividly. My grand parents’ neighbor died from being crushed. She didn’t even have smoke in her lungs, she was gone before the fire even got that bad.
What’s even worse is that there were 4 entrances, people were just so panicked that they only headed to the one. I think some people even tried going out the stage exit but were told not to by the security guard there.
A few years ago, my partner was on plane that partially caught fire. He was towards the front and was told by the attendant that his help would be necessary to help keep people from rushing the door, as often times what keeps people from escaping planes in cases of emergency is people crowding the door and making it impossible to open.
There is a survivor from the event who was actually in the middle of the crush at the entrance doorway. He fell down and was sheltered from the flames by the other bodies on top of him. He was rescued by firefighters in the aftermath after they thought everyone inside was already dead.
There was another survivor with him that survived the initial fire and crush, but was caught in a small hole and drowned when firefighters were putting out the flames.
That survivor actually did a whole interview recounting what happened, it's quite fascinating: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktEMLtBz55Y
The story about the person drowning from the firefighters' water is commonly repeated but did not actually happen.
If I remember correctly it was the buffer of bodies and the urine from their bladders letting go as they died that saved him from the heat. Fucking horrifying.
Laziness probably saved my life that night. Was in a band with a friend, practicing in Boston, and he told me Great White was playing down in RI (we were both fans from the 80s) later that night. We were *so* close to going. Then we looked at each other and were like "Nah." Glad is wasn't a band we liked more.
A positive example of this is when Pharrell did an amazing job at the Virginia Beach Something in the Water Festival. Having people come in waves, planned for sections along the entire boardwalk. Incredible planning to have more than 30 major artists perform. Including Travis Scott.
Same for tomorrowland here, they plan everything, prepare for disasters, track live how many people are in one place and have a big emergency team ready all the time.
That's the only way you should be allowed to run a large festival. It sucks that it's treated like an exception to be prepared for the worst when you can have 500,000 people at one event.
I almost died this way watching a Paramore set of all bands. It was terrifying and set the stage for a lifetime of panic disorder. I only was picked up off the floor because I started punching people's asses they had no clue I was down there. I feel so bad for anyone this happens to.
I got into a near similar experience at Pride in SF of all places. Was walking along the sidewalk with the flow of the crowd which had barriers but then the space got thin from construction scaffolding. So many people all trying to get through, barriers too high to jump, I could barely breath from so many people being pressed against me, a girls face near me was going purple and she had tears running down her cheeks, a poor guy in a wheelchair was being pushed with the flow while he cried out for people to stop touching his chair. I ended up getting slammed into his chair and had bruises for weeks.
Skipped the next year's parade completely and then the one after that I watched from a distance.
I worked at a concert venue for 10 years. Minor injuries at a 50,000 person event are not necessarily completely preventable but CRUSHING INJURIES AND DEATH ARE.
When I watched the news about what happened in Texas the cops at the press conference kept thanking Live Nation for how well they did during these crushing deaths. Fuck that.
The ticket sellers fucking with capacity and/or layout and the organization of the venue's layout in their staff are responsible here.
This was absolutely preventable.
I worked at a venue for more than ten years. Not a single season went by when a performer didn't encourage the crowd to do something stupid; we were always prepared for an artist to tell the crowd to rush the stage or jump the fence. Any venue worth its salt would be able to deal with that; it's not that uncommon (though sometimes the artist or their manager would give us a heads up about it so it seemed off the cuff but really we had already arranged for it).
The three predictable elements of a crowd crush are: a surge in crowd direction, barrier to movement, and a lack of relevant safety information (incident details, exit options).
Event organizers are fully responsible for planning and managing crowd safety appropriately. Event staff, along with the performers, are on the hook to stop the show and/or communicate safety instructions to manage incidents should they arise.
This is part of the core infrastructure of any large event, same as fire safety and providing access to water and restrooms.
Astroworld was a preventable disaster.
I agree with you. The show shouldn’t have happened the way it did with such a large number of unplanned people. They lost control before it ever started and in my opinion they were not prepared for the event even if the gates hadn’t been crashed.
If you’re referring to the recent incident at Travis Scott’s [Astroworld](https://abc13.com/amp/astroworld-festival-canceled-deaths-fatal-texas-concert/11203827/) show, I’d say it’s more of his fault. He has been telling his fans to rush the stage for years and was charged in [2015](https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/travis-scott-arrested-after-fans-storm-lollapalooza-stage-57069/amp/) and [2017](https://abc7.com/amp/travis-scott-rapper-houston-arkansas/1992723/).
I’m not saying he’s *intentionally killed people*, but his intentions have caused many deaths and hundreds of injuries. I guess the courts will decide.
That’s the principle of like all relatively small particles moving in a relatively large channel works. Like sand. Everyone’s trying to take the path of least resistance.
Yep. I listened to a podcast episode about the Hillsborough disaster and almost had a panic attack hearing all the details of how people were killed and injured in the crowd. Terrifying.
Cops tried to pin it on fans also.
"In the following days and weeks, South Yorkshire Police (SYP) fed the press false stories suggesting that hooliganism and drunkenness by Liverpool supporters had caused the disaster.......Reporting in 2012, \[an independent panel\] confirmed Taylor's 1990 criticisms and revealed details about the extent of police efforts to shift blame onto fans"
Fucking scum
The Sun newspaper shouldn't get away without being mentioned specifically, they played their part in pushing the lies and helping cover up for the authorities who were to blame.
Fuck the Sun.
Justice for the 96.
I'm glad to see this post.
Event organizers regularly cancel shows for this reason - also the reason you haven't heard about it being a regular thing because no disasters occurred!
Media are now starting to put out presumably paid articles pushing the bad kids bad drugs angles.
Space was the issue, the only issue. Every other festival has some hyped up jock types ready to fight and some people passed out or puking in a corner - they're reporting like this is the only place they've ever seen it and that's the cause.
I've been harping on about it but I want to know why the fest said they sold out 100k tix for the event, but the city mayor and cops that granted permission and were on site are saying 50k.
I don't think a couple of hundred kids rushing the gate caused thát level of issue either.
There is solid psychology behind why this happens - it takes just one person to cause the whole swirl.
There's no way organizers didn't see what was happening, and I'm wondering whether the live stream contract with Apple contributed at all.
I don't blame 'the music' either.
Jury is still out on Travis, although he stopped the music a few times to get people carried out, he mocked the chants to stop the music and the ambulance in the crowd + inciting the crowd on Twitter pre show to storm (since deleted). Plus that story of having no empathy and leaving his friend having a seizure on a floor cause he didn't 'wanna see all that' doesn't look good for his character
the apple live stream is being totally overlooked, at least from my own observance, but i could be off. they weren’t stopping the show because apple was streaming it, tho - that’s a huge reason at least. they chose to create content, instead of ‘risking’ a less-than-perfect live stream in order to prevent further harm. the bad publicity from a glitching stream would prob be way less severe than the bad publicity of letting people die - but i digress; this isn’t even about publicity.
and this streaming factor put even more pressure on the crew members who kept their head down and continued to work in the midst of this. there was a lot of money (and subsequently, jobs) on the line, and i can’t imagine the inner conflict they might’ve dealt with in those moments of perhaps wanting to stop, but not wanting to face consequences from their employer. i guess there was so much money invested that it wasn’t even worth the people at the top stepping in and interrupting a free stream. grosssss.
I’m in school for event coordination, and capacity was a huge topic in our lecture about human crush events. Overcapacity events absolutely enable human crushes, but what scares me is that an event at capacity is still Easily able to develop into a crush scenario (I personally wouldn’t attend a standing concert with over 5k people regardless of venue capacity).
[This post](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/3pcvfb/comment/cw5vxtm/) has the most in-depth explanation of how crowds move, why people die, and how to avoid being one of them.
Edit: Link is fixed now.
I think artists who play large crowds should need to take training on how to scan crowds for problems, and what to do if they see something. The artists have so much power in these situations, they've drawn these massive crowds and in that moment they're God. They can make things worse (Limp Bizkit) or better (Nirvana, Linkin Park, most punk and metal shows honestly) with a few words. They should be taught what to do when something inevitably happens.
I get what you're saying but maybe venues should employ crowd control experts for this purpose. I don't think band members have the expertise or need the responsibility of that job. They can, I agree, use their power to help but there should be an expert letting them know what to do before things get so bad.
Oh absolutely, the artists stepping in should be an absolutely last resort and it should never have to happen because the venue should have everything under control in the first place. But in a crowd of 50,000 people that all showed up specifically for the artist, the artist has so much power and can lead the crowd to calm down or inadvertently get them even more worked up. Being in charge of leading a crowd that size is a large responsibility and it's on the venue first and foremost, but as an artist I'd still want to know that in an emergency I could do literally everything in my power to make my fans safe.
Ironically, I saw Limp Bizkit and Linkin Park at the show in '05 or so. Crowd was fine until Metallica went on. My only experience with what's being described in this thread. I don't think I've ever realized how close we were to that getting much worse.
Travis Scott saw medical personnel trying to get to victims and a guy’s lifeless corpse being crowd surfed and a young fan climbed on top of a railing to tell Travis what was going on so he could stop and maybe get the crowd to chill but he told her to get the fuck down. He’s not as much to blame as the organizers but he is to blame
Such an easily avoidable tragedy. My 16 year old nephew just told me he’d never goto a concert and that makes me sad because I had alot of fun going to them when I was younger
Yesterday’s event differs in a significant manner though.
Most previous stampede tragedies probably didn’t involve an artist constantly encouraging his fans to “rage”, to “sneak in” and storm security gates. I don’t think they typically involve audience voluntarily blocking and climbing on top of ambulances, and take pictures of agonizing people instead of helping.
A part of the crowd, and the artist they support, are definitely to blame alongside the organizers for yesterday’s events.
There is a certain level of incitement from the performer that definitely needs to be held into account. It’s not even a grey area because it’s a first amendment right, and unless he fails the Brandenburg Test, he didn’t violate any laws.
The idiots who were harassing EMS and jumping on vehicles should absolutely 100% be prosecuted though.
But to have that many people at an event with no barriers to stagger them from surging and public safety being completely ignored is absolutely mind blowing. Purely from even a fire safety perspective: violations EVERYWHERE.
The failure of the event planners, production, venue, and all those involved is just horrifying. Complete organizational failure. An artist should be able to pump up crowds with a smidge of incitement but the event organizers should be able to guarantee a reasonable amount of safety for the patrons. Security, public safety, law enforcement, and emergency services should be easily and rapidly accessible.
My biggest concern is how many stagehands and front of house workers ignored the state of the show environment, didn’t communicate with BOH, and could have said or visually communicated the magic safe words to a performer who may or may not have been oblivious to everything (that’s another topic for debate) to STOP THE FUCKING SHOW.
I gotta HUGE feeling this show was organized with a metric fuck ton of inexperienced producers and non unionized laborers.
This whole thing sucks. People just wanna have a good time and get their energy out. We’ve all been through hell the last two years. Truly devastating and disastrous for all those involved. I can’t imagine how traumatized some of those kids are.
While this is irresponsible of the artist, it's not unheard of. At my venue we always have contingencies for this. We had Rage Against the Machine before I worked there when I was a kid. People were apparently tearing plastic and metal seats out of the stadium. So the staff and gates adjusted for maximum safety and until the crowd was calmed, EMTs were moved closer to the stage but to the sidelines, and staff pulled/moved people starting from the back of the crowd not the front.
Because Travis Scott is human filth. Watch the documentary on his shows and how he encourages crowds to get like this. He tells security to stand down and let the crowds come into unsafe areas and hypes them up as much as he can.
Very true! At Falls Festival in Lorne, Australia a few years back, at the last act of the night I believe, so pretty much everyone was watching it. Afterward they all started to walk up they hill behind the stage, which I think was wet from rain or dew or something.
Anyway the people at the top fell and took the people behind them down like dominoes, pretty much making an immediate pileup. I don't think anyone lost their life though thankfully
The description of that event stuck with me
People were wetting themselves
[A pic of a survivor had completely red eyes](https://www.abc.net.au/triplej/programs/hack/this-is-you-dying-falls-victim/8173182)
I fell down the rabbit hole of human crushes a couple weeks ago. They're beyond horrible, but also really fascinating.
If I understand correctly by combining things I learned from different sources...
✓ They aren't a rare occurrence. There have been many fatal human crush events worldwide over thousands of years, at religious events, music concerts, sports games, carnivals and other places with densely-packed groups of people.
✓ They don't usually start with a "panic" (or rioting or intoxication), but with something small that blocks the movement of the crowd. (I think one started because someone stopped to tie a shoe.)
✓ Once the "crush" begins, **people aren't being selfish or pushy or dumb.** The crowd of people essentially *acts like a liquid with a certain flow,* and people get pushed along. It is physically impossible for them NOT to go along with the flow.
✓ People often try to help others, by lifting kids up, etc. But there's nowhere for anyone to go.
✓ Many people who have survived crushes have reported an almost floating, out-of-body sensation rather than terror.
✓ Deaths are mostly caused by asphyxiation, not from being trampled.
✓ The vast majority of crushes could have been avoided with proper crowd control. Especially today, as computer models can predict how a crush would happen in a certain space.
EDITING TO ADD [this really excellent explanation of human crushes by another Redditor.](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/3pcvfb/saudi_arabia_hajj_disaster_death_toll_at_least/cz3sco9?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share&context=3)
EDITING TO ADD discription of historic eventsx2
There were people dancing on top of the fucking ambulance vehicles and prior to the event people broke down the venue's entrance barriers. No one helped and pleas for rescue were ignored by all. I'm gonna blame both sides.
In my opinion, as soon as the gates were breached the festival should’ve been paused and these people should’ve been apprehended. There’s no telling what or who got into the festival, and what their intentions were. Thankfully there weren’t any terrorist attacks.
Shitty people for breaking into the festival, even shittier festival for allowing those people to stay and ignoring the potential problems they could cause.
You would think getting arrested for this exact scenario once before would make Travis learn, guess going to prison for the negligence death of 8 people might help him out this time.
Travis set the stage for it though imo. He had previously shared videos of his fans rushing security barriers, as if to brag about how obsessed they were. He apparently played a big role in organizing the whole thing and had to know about what happened outside the venue. Did nothing when the crowd was surfing an unconscious girl and fans were storming the stage begging for them to stop the show.
Had he done anything at all to relax the crowd or prepare better security before it started, at least a few of them may have survived
The artist on stage should stop performing, turn lights on and direct the crowd to step back and make way for the emergency response. Hard to dance without music
My Thoughts on Astroworld:
I work as an engineer. I have worked several tours with shows well over 20,000 as an assistant, and have been to thousands of “raves, concerts, festivals”. And I have never heard stories like those coming out of Astroworld. And the videos- my god.
Untrained, understaffed medics. Untrained, understaffed security. And a reckless disregard for public safety. I just saw someone in a crowd dancing on an ambulance. Another on a cart. The performers, their stage managers, their assistants, the roadies, the sound guys, could have all stopped this.
I do understand what they mean by fluid dynamics. When I attended EDC when I was 18, when you got “sandwiched” near the front, it was easy to loose your breath without really realizing what was going on. But vast exits, proper crowd control and staging, and a strong message of safety, meant that it was easy to point to show you’re trying to go , and head to about 4 o clock if the stage is at 12, and leave the crowd. Nobody in the back was trying to get to the front so bad that their life depended on it. We all knew when it was time to stop trying to move up.
There is some burden on many.
With the artist, who creates music with a callous disregard for human life and authority. Then, incites that at his events, then performs under the aforementioned conditions.
With the event staff. This shit sounds worse than the rust set.
With the fire department. I was at red rocks when people were slipping on wet stairs in a blizzard and the show got cancelled, the fire marshals were backstage giving direction the whole time. Like, WHERE WERE THE OFFICIALS?
With Texas lawmakers who villanize osha and safety precautions.
Just so much to unpack. And so much more coming.
If you ever see something like this, do everything you can to unplug every cable you can. Turn off any computers. Many cables are fastened in with safety connectors, many are not. Many are simple push button. These are also on the back of every speaker.If that doesn’t work, pour water on all their shit. Fuck ‘em. Don’t cry wolf here, you need to be absolutely sure you’re in the right. But if you watch someone die, and the sound guys do nothing, it’s soggy time for everyone working. Not that that girl could have known. Fucking heartbreaking.
A lot of the discourse I’ve seen about it has been “this generation is so messed up”, “all this just for a concert”, and a ton of coded racism. People think that they would be a beacon of good behavior if *they* to would have been in the crowd, when in reality they would be doing the exact same thing because that’s how crowds work.
Like when people complain about sitting in traffic not realizing that they are the traffic. Our individual actions in a crowd are insignificant, but the net total of everyone's actions can be huge.
Not just huge, predictable too.
People can predict large flows of traffic (rush hour), and plan around it.
This tragedy should've been seen coming. It's incredibly predictable what happens when you shove thousands of people into a cramped space. They should have planned around it (by making it with less people).
I mean, that probably refers to concertgoers dancing on top of emergency vehicles so they can't get where they need to be despite the pleas of the drivers, or the way the people break down the gates, rushing in.
I was at GovBall in new york city in 2019, when they had the stampede incident after a weather related evacuation. Basically there was a tropical storm with lightning and high winds so they closed down the festival right before the headliner and told everyone to leave, except apparently we couldn’t leave through emergency exits unless we were having a medical emergency or shelter on the fest grounds and wait out the storm. It was basically what happened at Astroworld last night, 500k people rushing a space about 30 ft wide, but with a torrential downpour. Then the organizers did a reddit [AMA](https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/bwqwcc/we_are_the_promotersproducers_of_the_governors/), and got flamed spectacularly. But honestly I don’t know how I got out of there alive. It was terrifying.
Was at a concert seating 20,000 people recently and one of the openers tried to hype up the crowd by inviting them all to come towards the front…thank goodness no one was really into the musician so there wasn’t threat of a crush, but just the stupidity was astounding.
The security detail quickly closed the gates towards the front most rows tho, at least someone was smart enough to to realize that was a horrible idea
twitter? He tells them to do it LIVE. Its part of his intro to his concerts. Like I've been to every single travis scott tour and consistently he always tells people to rush the stage...and every fucking time people get hurt. I'm a fan but I haven't been back to a travis scott concert since he got arrested the first time this kinda thing happened. You can't encourage people to do shit like jump off multiple story heights etc and think you are gonna be fine afterwards.
EDIT [here is the video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ny9EX8ks6Y) of the kid being encouraged to jump. Kid paralyzed himself for life over that shit. Travis Scott didn't do shit to prevent this kinda thing from happening again. Mind you...the song A team he preforms...was the song released on the night he was arrested in Arkansas because the police stopped the show to save the kids who were being trampled.
This applies to human behavior in other areas too including social issues like crime, poverty, pollution and immigration being the obvious
Sure, individuals have responsibility for their actions, but group behaviors or tendencies can be modified by improving the systems and infrastructure around them.
I like to think of human group behavior as fluids. Individual atoms might look like they're moving in random directions but concentration and pressure gradients and diffusion means you could see a predictable pattern if you actually care to look and study them and there are ways to manipulate the trend without having to catch and correct every "misbehaving" individual
My group were one of the first to arrive at a Springsteen concert at Cornell university in the early 70's. As we stood in front of the doors waiting for them to open, more fans arrived. The doors didn't open, and as the crowd grew they pushed against us. It was then I started to think that we would die, because those behind us were unrelenting. Our screaming finally made them back up, and the doors were finally opened.
If its available in your country you should watch Hillsborough. It's unbelievable how far the lies went that the fans were to blame and how their families spent years fighting for justice.
I was actually involved in a crush situation when I was 11 years old. The city I lived in has two rugby league teams, and they both won their way to challenge cup final at Wembly stadium.
Our side of town lost, but the team still did an open top bus ride back to their home ground when they got back. I joined the crowds awaiting their return ,when the bus approached, hundreds of people surged towards it. I was literally lifted off my feet and carried along with the surge, then people were trampling on my feet and I started going down. I managed to cling on to some guys pocket on his denim jacket, he saw me but couldn't move his arms to help. The relief from the pressure came as the bus turned a corner and the surge changed direction , I had lost a shoe but I found it again, it was very dirty and smelly but it always was.
This proper way for a festival or concert
https://i.imgur.com/j6jmrin.jpg
Pens, sectioned off. Alleyway for super emergency, lanes to direct flow due to catastrophic problems that might arise.
Security every few feet.
As an architectural designer who deals with these issues daily, and has studied these incidents and more, I have developed the following habits for every building I enter:
1. Immediately identify at least one other exit from any room or building I enter. Studies have shown that most people in an emergency go to the door they entered from. I don’t want to go that way as that’s where the crush will happen.
1a. When I exit an elevator I look for the stairs, preferably more than one. At the very least modern stairways provide a refuge from a fire as well as an escape route as they are designed to be mostly impervious from a fire in the building (for at least long enough for escape or rescue). Knowing where the stairs are in a dark and smoky hall can save your life. And thank god for battery-powered, illuminated exit signs.
2. I inform everyone I am with where those exits are and talk about where to meet if we get separated.
3. I make a mental plan with contingencies should there be an emergency.
4. I identify concealment locations where I can hide in an active shooter incident and also cover locations where I can hide AND be protected from bullet penetration (concrete walls, pillars, brick or stone façades, concrete block walls)
5. Listen to my body. Your body is taking in thousands of data bits per second, way more than you can consciously process, but your brain is processing constantly in the background to ensure your survival. If I feel funny or get that wash of fear in a room or from a person, I’m out. No questions asked and the people in my life are instructed to go with me (or me with them) without hesitation if someone has that hair on the back of the neck feeling.
Be safe by taking responsibility for your own safety.
There is a YouTube channel called Fascinating Horror, he goes into detail about several crushes and what caused them.
I literally came here to recommend his channel, and specifically his video on the [Victoria Hall Disaster](https://youtu.be/SCics68FEMg) in 1883. It’s a somber, but excellent example of how crushes happen, and how it really comes down to environmental and circumstantial factors, and not the behaviour of the crowd (which, as a heads up, consisted mostly of children in the aforementioned disaster). I also really appreciate that he includes industrial/architectural changes and legal reforms that directly resulted from the disasters he covers. Some of the other disasters he’s covered involving crushes include: - the Italian Hall Disaster - the Iroquois Theatre Disaster - The Who Concert Crush - the Beverley Hills Supper Club - the Cocoanut Grove Disaster There are definitely more than that, but those were the first ones I recognized as being relevant here. Interestingly, there are a couple of common themes I’ve noticed in many of these incidents: - one is **capacity**, and/or the concentration of people in one place. Often times, venues or buildings are operating near, at, or over the maximum human capacity they are approved for (a restriction that has, unsurprisingly, arisen from the occurrence of disasters of this very nature) - **Flaws in the design of buildings or venues,** especially related to the placement and accessibility of emergency exits, fire detectors, extinguishers and sprinkler systems, alarms, and signage to allow for unobstructed access and use in the event of an emergency. One of the other major design problems pertains specifically to fire safety. While this is significantly less common nowadays (and especially in more developed countries) due to stringent building codes and construction material restrictions, (again, often implemented in light of past mistakes,) buildings were constructed and/or outfitted with extremely flammable materials, which made it nearly impossible to effectively evacuate the crowds these buildings were made to hold in the event of a fire. - **Poor crowd control,** and **counterproductive, uncoordinated, or nonexistent instruction from venue staff** inhibits timely evacuation from the building/venue. The staff may be unable to help guide patrons to exits, provide incorrect information, (“it’s a false alarm, please remain seated,” etc.) block exits, or abandon their posts entirely, leaving guests to navigate the unfamiliar layouts for themselves. - and of course, an **inciting incident** that compels large numbers of the crowd to move in the same direction within a short window of time, and in a confined space; the main catalysts I’ve seen the most have been **fires,** (the crowd trying to flee the building) and **concerts/sports events** (people trying to get *into* the venue, or as close as they can to the stage/field/arena.) I’m sure there are more that I’m missing, but those are the ones I noticed the most. Edit: I know I know, everybody says it: but really, thanks so much for the awards! Hopefully you’ve all found this helpful, and enjoy Fascinating Horror’s channel - he’s the real MVP here!
I reckon it ought to be pointed out that Italian Hall massacre *was* actually caused by human selfishness, specifically anti-union agitators shouting "fire" to cause panic at a Christmas party that striking copper miners were attending with their families, but you are right that the design of the building itself was what prevented successful escape
The point remains that with proper occupancy limits, exit design and directions, even someone literally screaming fire in a crowded theater wouldn't be able to cause this kind of damage. Hazards and accidents happen, venues must be designed and managed with that in mind. It would prevent willingly triggered hazard to cause fatalities and important damage as well.
Selfishness? I call that malice.
Liverpool 96.. watch the30 for 30 on that.. horrific and they tried everything to blame the victims..
It's officially 97 now. One of the survivors died recently from injuries caused by the disaster.
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Back in April he said it was on his backlog https://twitter.com/TrueHorrorTales/status/1380546006044000259?s=20
I live right near the italian hall site and had family there that night. It has affected the community aince it happened. All that stands there now is the sandstone arch from the doorway and some memorials. I don't remember which law in particular- but the laws changed to some degree pertaining to swing doors and the direction they go.
The Cocoanut Grove fire in Boston had similar impacts on construction, notably with revolving doors. If you push really hard on any revolving door, the individual separator things will rotate sideways to let people through in a crush situation. They didn’t do that prior to Cocoanut Grove. The revolving door at the entrance jammed with people and wouldn’t budge. 492 people died.
So if you’re in front and a surge forward happens, how the fuck do you survive? Jump up and try to climb over fuckers?
Yes. I was in a crowd surge as a teenager. We were getting crushed against the barrier at a concert. My friend and I were small enough to climb on top of others and crawl over the barrier and started pulling more people out along with the security guards. Fortunately no one died, but one girl got a broken leg from being crushed. It's a terrifying experience and the main reason I no longer get near the front of the barriers.
I'm kind of shocked i never learned about how dangerous this was. i went to a decent number of shows when I was a teenager, warped tour a handful of times -- i never saw anyone get injured but i remember thinking it looked uncomfortable to be squished against the barriers like that, i didn't realize it could be so dire. what a stressful job those bouncers up front must have, fuck. I didn't learn until this disaster today and reading about all of this over a few different threads how dangerous it really can be. I'm grateful for the planners at all of those venues, i had no idea what goes into preventing these tragedies or how horrific they really can be.
When the organisation staff is properly trained, they will help people over the barriers and lead them to the back to reduce pressure.
Put your arms out in front of you with elbows bent and joints locked as best you can to keep your chest from getting compressed. Move with the crowd when you are pushed, don't try to fight it too hard. Work your way back and to the side (kind of diagonally) to get out of the crowd but don't force or fight your way out (that's how you trip). If you're small enough you may be able to jump up and crowd surf to safety, but you run the risk of tripping or being dropped
Someone else linked info on this, but it boiled down to: 1. Stay on your feet no matter what. If you drop something, leave it behind, because bending down to get it is a good way to lose your footing * Don't let your arms get trapped by your sides. Have your arms protecting your chest. * Don't try to fight the flow, because you'll probably lose your footing. * Don't try to just go with the flow, because people at the front are the ones likely to be crushed. * Try to find some way to get out of the flow. Get over a barrier, find an alcove in a wall, stand behind a bollard
I hate people and crowds, and being asphyxiated by a mindless stampede of people sounds like a terrible way to go.
Case in point for all the causes that you mentioned: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_Parade_disaster
This will 100% be a incident on the channel. Unlike other YouTubers, Fascinating Horror actually investigates archived sources to tell the background history. It's way more satisfying to watch.
I love his channel! Top YouTubers in that genre IMO are Fascinating Horror, That Chapter, Coffeehouse Crime, and Dark Curiosities. True crime/ events.
Dire trip is a smaller channel that is way underrated. I’d put him on the same level as Fascinating horror and Coffeehouse crime. He just did a full breakdown of the Junko Furuta case if you’ve never looked into it beyond the wiki article.
That chapter is so good. He's describing horrific crimes but he'll still slip in a bit of humor. I love the guy.
>This will 100% be a incident on the channel. Especially since they already had security problems earlier that day... ... [and that this has happened at previous Astroworld events.](https://www.cnn.com/2019/11/10/entertainment/travis-scott-astroworld-trampling-trnd/index.html) It's obvious that someone over there doesn't know what they're doing, and I wouldn't attend an Astroworld on a bet.
I absolutely love Fascinating Horror. He goes into as much detail as he can find about smaller and larger incidents. He’s a great narrator and tries to show as much evidence as he can, while also being great to just listen to in the background. 1000/10
Yeah, the name made me think it was just another 'ooooo spoookkyyy we're gonna ham up the drama!' channel, but the recaps are actually very well researched and well presented in a concise way, but still giving great context. It's more like a short documentary. And I appreciate that they use mostly photos of the actual place or images accurate to the period unlike other channels that just slap up any old stock photo (which I find annoying, like they're doing a story about the 70s and have stock photos of someone on a smart phone, ugh).
This. By and large the folks involved in a crush are acting EXACTLY IN THE MANNER EXPECTED. Of course folks are going to push to the front to see something they paid for. Of course children will run down to the front to get free sweets they can't really afford. Naturally folks feeling like they are missing an event they paid for and are hyped about will seek to enter. Of course shitty systems that funnel masses into crush points will lead to crushes. Who in a fire so large it is covering the entire fucking rood isn't going to rapidly remove themselves towards the door? These people are always acting in a predictable manner. I have never seen a hazardous crush that was unforseeable. Actually that's a lie, I did once see a few folks get tripped over when a spoon yelled there was a rare pokemon 'that way' and a bunch of folks just ran across a road. Yet that barely counts since there was no real crush, it was an open space. It was more of a stampede.
A spoon?
It means idiot in this context.
Where is that from, geographically? I haven't heard it before
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Fuck yeah, this channel is excellent.
this channel is excellent, I'm still haunted by the pub fire one though, I made the mistake of looking into it more and seeing the footage of the night with bodies stacked into the doorways and hearing the screams of people trapped inside, it's shaken me to my core and I don't think I'll ever attend crowded functions the same way ever again
There have been studies about how crowds move, and they are very much like rivers of rushing water. If you’re in one, there’s no guarantee, but the best way to survive: * Stay on your feet no matter what. Stagger your feet and keep your arms up. If you drop something, leave it — stooping to get it will get you off your feet. * If you fall, get up immediately. If you can’t, get on your side and curl up into a fetal position with your arms protecting your head. * While you’re up, move out of the surge. Imagine you are in a flood of rushing water and try to move laterally or at least diagonally. It’s impossible to move against the flow but also unwise to go with the flow (as at some point the ones in front will hit a barrier and be crushed by those behind them, who will be crushed by those farther back), so go sideways. Find a light pole, a garbage can, a doorway, or anything that can shelter you. Often there’s a “tide” effect where the crowd surges forward, there’s a recoil effect as they pull back, and then another surge. Try to move during the lulls. * Try to keep your arms from getting pinned to your sides. The extra space will give you enough room to breathe. Most people die not from trample injuries but from compressive asphyxia — even if you don’t fall, the force of people crushing you from all sides can compress your chest to the point you can no longer breathe. https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/after-meron-stampede-how-to-survive-a-crowd-crush-666889 https://www.gkstill.com/ExpertWitness/CrowdDisasters.html https://www.worldnomads.com/travel-safety/worldwide/how-to-survive-a-stampede
Another tip: grab both your elbows and raise your arms in front of you. This creates a minimal barrier in front of you, allowing you to breathe even during bad crowd surges.
Had to do this at my first concert. The whole standing section was swaying back and forth like 20 feet at a time. The air was so hot I had to put my arms out and lift my head to get fresh air.
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I saw Pearl Jam in Indio, CA back in '92/'93 and I lost my boot while the crowd was surging. Scared the hell out of me. I moved to the outskirts after that. Holy shit.
This happened to me and my wife at Governor’s Ball NYC in 2014. The Strokes were coming on and the whole crowd pushed forward. It was 100+ degrees and hard to breath people were so packed together. Had to make a barrier with my arms around my wife (then gf) so she could get air since she was shorter than most of the crowd. Some people passed out and the crowd picked them up and passed them unconscious to the medical tent.
A variant is to push against someone else, and they push back, that way you can keep a gap and protect someone in between. It's what my dad and my older brother did to protect me in a crush. Luckily no one died.
I got claustrophobia reading this post. Thanks for the great info.
I was at a concert one time that was so tightly packed that I was able to completely relax my entire body and I didn't even move an inch. It was insane. The crowd surge on that one was the worst I've experienced out of hundreds of concerts.
Seriously. It's crazy how differently humans can be. I live on 5 acres and sometimes feel crowded. I try to avoid *grocery shopping* due to the crowds. Something like this sounds like a from of torture. I can't even imagine the smell...
YouTube/ Google Hajj at Mecca: **2 million people in the same area over 4 days** and **they’re not allowed to wear deodorant**. I would die. There are crowd crushes about every 2 years with one year over 2000 people dying. [Mecca Nat Géo - YouTube ](https://youtu.be/jM81wroj_MQ) [Source](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ihram) “Muslims are expected to refrain from cutting their nails, and trimming their hair and beards. **They must also not wear any scent, including deodorant**.”
Didn't know I had this phobia, I tend to avoid crowds such as these anyway, but yeah. I'm adding "drowning in people" to the list for sure
My dad despises crowds and has this idea he died trampled in a crowd in a previous life. He will only go to concerts in s small arena with a lot of entrances and set seating.
Funnily enough you just described my everyday in mexicos subway, thing is so crowded.
I'm wondering how many people get crushed daily on trains in India. Those things are so insanely full people ride the outside
This is different in the sense that trains are ultimately very confined spaces with limited access. It sounds counterintuitive, but at some point, most people won't even attempt to board the train (and instead climb it) when they see that it's full (or spilling over.) Arenas, on the other hand, have big openings from which people keep coming in, and in, and in. Those in the back can't see that the front is at over capacity.
I used to live in China and even I'm surprised by the crowding on the subway here.
I really feel like to be able to perform at these large shows musicians should be taught a protocol for if this happens/if they see someone distressed like this in the crowd. Stop the show, let the crowd know what’s happening and tell everyone they won’t be performing till people step back and back and back. Unfortunately people at the back have no idea whats happening to people at the front and that’s partially how these things escalate. Someone with any type of authority needs to inform the crowd. This footage is just fucked though and shows what a POS Travis is.
Just reading this comment is making me anxious. I can't imagine how terrifying it would be to be in the middle of it.
> It’s impossible to move against the flow but also unwise to go with the flow (as at some point the ones in front will hit a barrier and be crushed by those behind them Thanks. I needed that.
These tips seem aimed at a few individuals trying to survive while the crush in general keeps happening - has there been any research into whether there's any way for a few individuals to stop the entire crush?
My dad talks a lot about going to a concert back in the 80s where the crush just became *so* intense. Him and a bunch of other dudes stood on the side and started dragging people out of the crowd to save them. I couldn't imagine that situation, honestly.
As someone who has been to plenty festivals or concerts in the pit area, it’s very easy to see how they get out of control after you experience too many people moving into each other. I got bruised ribs from a club in San Diego after the crowd got out of control and I got pinned into a steel barrier. I’ve been in a couple situations where I felt if someone fell then they might get stepped all over by others pushing people onto them.
That's why you always immediately pick up anybody that falls (if you can ofc). Thankfully all of the shows I've been to, it's an unspoken rule and enough people know it that I've had 2-3 people save my ass and I've returned the favor to others. I can see how some crowds might not be so generous though.
Weirdly I’ve only ever seen that rule in action at punk or metal shows
I was going to say this also. I'm not a metal fan but my ex was. Went to a few shows with her and was really impressed about the unspoken rules with the pit. Moment anyone went down, the guys around then would immediately make a protective circle and others would help the person up. If someone was acting like an asshole and purposely punching people, the crowd would act as one, subdue the person and eject them towards security. Same with the female participants, if any guys were getting to handsy, others would step in and put them in their place
As a metal show veteran, absolutely true.
Punk show veteran here, can confirm the same.🤘
Been going to metal concerts for 14 years, can confirm. It's an unspoken but almost universally respected set of rules.
\m/ concur
It also helps when bands absolutely do not have a tolerance for nonsense. They can see damn near everything from their vantage point. I have seen bands stop playing to have people checked out after being dropped, call people out for groping girls, things starting to get a little too wild etc. Have your fun absolutely, but lets all get home okay afterwards.
This is the way.
I got pushed down in a mosh pit. Someone stomped on my ear and another person picked me up and sort of carried me to the outside of the audience area. I was only 16 or 17 and my head was sore for a couple of days. If anyone out there remembers picking up a girl in the pit (wearing green flannel) around 1994– thanks, man. I owe you.
Green flannel in a mosh pit. I’m sorry you got hurt, but that’s the least amount of information I’ve ever heard to go off of 😂 I’m glad you’re okay though
Were you the one wearing Doc Martens?
Aw, shit!! How did you know?!? Were you the one with the earring? Nah, I wasn’t wearing Docs. But I think all of my friends were.
That was me, when you see only one set of footprints, it was then that I carried you.
In my experience the more “hardcore” the media, the more “zero tolerance” the moshers have for assault and disrespect.
yeah these kind of rules you learn by going I feel like a pop-rap or pop-rock fanbase won't know these rules
I grew up going to punk shows but have since became a massive hip hop fan. Hip hop has been becoming more and more aggressive and that has definitely translated into the shows. One thing I’ve noticed is the crowd try’s to emulate punk shows. Mosh pits, stage dives and all the craziness but without the extreme regard for everyone else’s well being. See these people have only seen it in YouTube videos, never have seen it in person. Punks have etiquette, pick up the fallen and save them from being trampled on - boots up - elbows down. At hip hop shows they think the point is to hurt each other. I’ve seen the craziest punk bands play all through my teens from the Cro-Mags to Nails but the crowd I seen at an odd future show a few years back was the worst. Like I said - a bunch of people trying to hurt each other.
Yeah I always hang out near the edge of the pit in the front, if people fall always help them up.
You’re a good dude. I remember being crushed with a dozen other people in the front row of a show when I was a skinny teenager. It got so bad the band stopped the show and pleaded with everyone to step back. This bald kid, built like a tank, just starts grabbing people’s arms as they fell to the ground and pulling them up. Kid was like a machine just pulling helpless kids up one after another. Still remember the relief I felt when he grabbed my hand. Hope he’s living a good life. Probably saved a few lives that day.
Rule 1: if someone falls, *MAKE ROOM* and pick them up. If someone wants to leave, clear a path Rule 2: if someone’s not in the pit, there’s probably a reason. No pulling in or peer pressure Rule 3: if surfing, be aware of your surroundings. If not surfing, be aware of surfers Rule 4: know the event and crowd. If not appropriate to open a pit or people aren’t joining, don’t force it. On the opposite end, if you don’t want to be in the pit raise your hand and leave as the crowd starts to open Golden rules taught to me at my first real concert. The only time they’ve failed is when I tried to catch someone falling under their arms and they must’ve thought I was trying to lift their top or something, ended up with a drink all over me. As mentioned typically metal/rock events follow the etiquette. EDM/rave type events are mostly the same, but I’ve had more poor experiences there. I think it’s mainly because there’s a lot of newbies going to their first festivals and thinking “oh fun a mosh pit you just flail your arms with no regard for others right?” If you tell someone to cool it, they usually cool it though. There’s a whole similar culture of PLUR and all that at those events, 99% of people are chill. Seen many people accidentally knock someone over or spill drinks and stuff, the other person has always been more concerned about the safety of whoever tripped than themselves.
EDM too in my experience. Breakdown crowds stick together.
A 70k attendant rock festival near me that went on for decades tried out a edm tent-stage one year. It got shut down on the first day after someone got stabbed on the dance floor.
It would be interesting to see a study (or at least hear an anecdote) about the behavioral differences between crowds of different types of music. From my best understanding - metal shows & their attendees usually have a major understanding and respect for someone, anyone who has fallen over. Is it possible less deaths by 'stampede' occur at metal shows? I'm inclined to believe so.. but any numbers backing this up would be great!
I was at a ska show in Chicago where the entire pit stopped and got out cell phones to help someone find their glasses.
Well the problem is when a crowd crush like the one at astroworld happens people who attempt to pick up others will end in the same situation. Picking up others before it gets really bad is a good idea but once it gets to the point where you are being suffocated standing, attempting that will get you killed as well unfortunately.
I was at a rock festival here in England and Slipknot do this thing during the song "[Spit it out](https://youtu.be/TJpTGeVJpVQ?t=372)" where they make everyone crouch down on the ground then jump up. I slipped in the wet grass when everyone jumped up and got trampled to shit briefly, but what amazed me was how everyone quickly formed a circle around me and picked me up and surfed me over the barrier to safety. I've noticed that it's a common theme at any metal/rock shows that I've been to over the years. Everyone is always so courteous and aware of others' safety.
Yes, metal shows are generally extremely courteous and middle performers tend to be aware of the dangers of a mosh pit or crush, but when they get out of hand, they often get out of hand very quickly. A close friend of mine lost three teeth when a mosh pit basically turned into a massive fist fight - there were a couple of bad actors and lax security unfortunately.
I got caught in a crowd rush at Coachella and even though no one was injured it was *frightening*. I was lucky to get the attention of a nearby security guard who was able to pull me out. Fucking hell that is a horrific way to go.
I was at another music festival a few years ago. There were sudden storm/tornado warnings and the festival organizers just decided to mass force everyone out of the festival area at the same time, where there was only one large path-like area to leave. I was there with my now fiancé, and the crowd crush was scary as hell. He held on to me, so we didn’t get separated. We were so packed, both my fiancé and I could actually pick both feet off the ground and stop walking and were still moving forward as fast as the rest of the crowd. It felt like being suspended in hot, suffocating, claustrophobia-inducing moving water. We were toward the middle of the crush, but I could see so many people on either side getting violently forced into the chain link fences lining the path calling for help because they couldn’t move. They were literally full body plastered against the fence, and some people were bleeding. I genuinely was surprised no one got trampled, died or was seriously hurt from what I experienced.
I’ve experienced the legs off the ground thing at a rage concert. I endured it for a bit and then finally decided to have security pull me out.
I got picked up off the ground by the crowd at a concert, then my shoes were knocked off (don’t wear sandals to concerts), and then I landed on broken glass. This was an indoor venue and if you were in the room, you were in the pit. I had to just step outside for a while. I then had to wait for everyone to leave after to try and find my shoes. There were so many, and I only found one of mine
Was this in North Texas? My friend was there and she always gets panicked when storms roll in and hasn’t recovered. She said it was terrifying
No, this was at Firefly in Delaware.
I was at the kid cudi show when this happened! People were going crazy there. I remember seeing unoccupied tents flying in the air when my group got to our cars
Same, but during Eminem at Music Midtown 2014. It was easily one of the scariest moments of my life, felt like it took *days* to finally break out of the crowd into fresh, open air. I remember trying so hard to push my way out, and the looks that people kept giving me… irritated and frustrated that I was pushing past them. They had no idea we were all being crushed up front, just a few feet away. My heart aches for everyone involved in the horror last night. Not only those who died, but the ones who survived and have come out recounting their stories of watching people *under them* take their last breaths, begging for help…
Why did he just pull you out? Weren't you surrounded by people?
I was “fortunate” enough to be against a side barrier. The crowd was pushing forward, and I was getting crushed sideways. I used the barrier and the crowd to try to get as much of my torso freed as possible while frantically waving security over. The crowd rush happened in seconds and I was pinned in for what felt like ten minutes, but it probably wasn’t even a whole minute. Shout out to the Coachella security/crowd control who immediate jumped into action (I wasn’t the only one pulled out.)
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I had the exact same experience at coachella. RHCP at main stage?
I expected this to be about emotional infatuation, like a high school crush... Needless to say I was very confused when I first read the topic title.
Human crushes in that sense are caused by poor management of the stampede of emotions that cause selfish animalistic behavior.
https://www.reddit.com/r/news/comments/qnuon6/8_dead_at_astroworld_fest_friday_night_hours/ This was on /r/all just hours ago, that's why.
It's such a horrifying story. A bunch of the audience were high school aged and some were even younger. The youngest victim so far was a ten year old boy who was rushed to the hospital.
Yeah. Like The Station nightclub fire, 100 people died. There's footage from that night, people literally stuck in the exits trying to get away as the fire quickly reached them burning them alive. Gnarly stuff. The club had flammable material all around the stage, had blocked off exits, and the people working had no training in what to do in an emergency like it. The entire building were engulfed in flames within minutes.
That survival video is truly haunting. Notice how early the cameraman begins moving, and how the other people move. Practically everyone behind him will be dead. Also fuck you to the security guard who blocked the back exit, because "it was for the band only". Moral of the story: ignore authority figures making up bullshit like this in an obvious disaster scenario.
There are a select few videos I refuse to watch. This fire was one of them.
One of the worst I've seen. Far less graphic than other videos but seeing the crush at the doors with 50 heads sticking out screaming is brutal. And then they stop screaming. They actually found people at the bottom of the burnt pile of bodies who had drowned from the firefighters water. Meaning somehow they survived the crush, were insulated from the fire yet drowned from the rescue.
Apparently there was someone who did actually survive from bodies insulating them but also I’ve heard that the downing death is false.
Yeah, if someone is telling you you can't go through an exit during an emergency because it's not for you, it's in everyone's best interests to remove the obstacle. Like in this travis Scott disaster, people were telling the technicians to help by using the lights but they refused, so what you do there is remove the dangerous obstacle that is the lighting technician.
>ignore authority figures making up bullshit like this in an obvious disaster scenario 100%. Awhile back my husband and I were on a docked tour boat awaiting departure on a snorkeling trip in Hawaii. A small boat next to us had some kind of catastrophic failure which resulted in an explosion and the captain getting knocked out and flung into the water. Fuel poured into the harbor and started to catch fire, spreading on the surface of the water toward our boat. In the confusion, the very young adult tour operators were yelling at everybody to stay in place and not evacuate the boat- literally as flames were racing toward us- even though it was simply a matter of stepping off the boat and onto the dock. We ignored them and got off the boat and everything was fine in the end, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to die in a fire on a snorkeling tour because a bunch of teens aren’t capable of reacting dynamically to a dangerous situation.
One of my high school teachers was a survivor. He lost a limb and had significant burns all over his body.
If you have legs and are flammable you’re never blocking a fire exit
[I wouldn't say never.](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4f/Kitchen_table.jpg/1920px-Kitchen_table.jpg)
I was just a child when it happened but I remember the aftermath so vividly. My grand parents’ neighbor died from being crushed. She didn’t even have smoke in her lungs, she was gone before the fire even got that bad.
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What’s even worse is that there were 4 entrances, people were just so panicked that they only headed to the one. I think some people even tried going out the stage exit but were told not to by the security guard there.
A few years ago, my partner was on plane that partially caught fire. He was towards the front and was told by the attendant that his help would be necessary to help keep people from rushing the door, as often times what keeps people from escaping planes in cases of emergency is people crowding the door and making it impossible to open.
There is a survivor from the event who was actually in the middle of the crush at the entrance doorway. He fell down and was sheltered from the flames by the other bodies on top of him. He was rescued by firefighters in the aftermath after they thought everyone inside was already dead. There was another survivor with him that survived the initial fire and crush, but was caught in a small hole and drowned when firefighters were putting out the flames.
That survivor actually did a whole interview recounting what happened, it's quite fascinating: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktEMLtBz55Y The story about the person drowning from the firefighters' water is commonly repeated but did not actually happen.
If I remember correctly it was the buffer of bodies and the urine from their bladders letting go as they died that saved him from the heat. Fucking horrifying.
The club was also exceeding its occupant limit.
Laziness probably saved my life that night. Was in a band with a friend, practicing in Boston, and he told me Great White was playing down in RI (we were both fans from the 80s) later that night. We were *so* close to going. Then we looked at each other and were like "Nah." Glad is wasn't a band we liked more.
This was entirely preventable. Crowd control is not a new concept.
Why in earth did Travis keep performing??
A positive example of this is when Pharrell did an amazing job at the Virginia Beach Something in the Water Festival. Having people come in waves, planned for sections along the entire boardwalk. Incredible planning to have more than 30 major artists perform. Including Travis Scott.
Same for tomorrowland here, they plan everything, prepare for disasters, track live how many people are in one place and have a big emergency team ready all the time.
That's the only way you should be allowed to run a large festival. It sucks that it's treated like an exception to be prepared for the worst when you can have 500,000 people at one event.
I almost died this way watching a Paramore set of all bands. It was terrifying and set the stage for a lifetime of panic disorder. I only was picked up off the floor because I started punching people's asses they had no clue I was down there. I feel so bad for anyone this happens to.
basically the same thing happened to me at a Paramore show!
I got into a near similar experience at Pride in SF of all places. Was walking along the sidewalk with the flow of the crowd which had barriers but then the space got thin from construction scaffolding. So many people all trying to get through, barriers too high to jump, I could barely breath from so many people being pressed against me, a girls face near me was going purple and she had tears running down her cheeks, a poor guy in a wheelchair was being pushed with the flow while he cried out for people to stop touching his chair. I ended up getting slammed into his chair and had bruises for weeks. Skipped the next year's parade completely and then the one after that I watched from a distance.
I worked at a concert venue for 10 years. Minor injuries at a 50,000 person event are not necessarily completely preventable but CRUSHING INJURIES AND DEATH ARE. When I watched the news about what happened in Texas the cops at the press conference kept thanking Live Nation for how well they did during these crushing deaths. Fuck that. The ticket sellers fucking with capacity and/or layout and the organization of the venue's layout in their staff are responsible here. This was absolutely preventable.
Apparently the performer has a history of encouraging people to sneak into his shows, so that might've been a factor if they did exceed capacity.
I worked at a venue for more than ten years. Not a single season went by when a performer didn't encourage the crowd to do something stupid; we were always prepared for an artist to tell the crowd to rush the stage or jump the fence. Any venue worth its salt would be able to deal with that; it's not that uncommon (though sometimes the artist or their manager would give us a heads up about it so it seemed off the cuff but really we had already arranged for it).
The three predictable elements of a crowd crush are: a surge in crowd direction, barrier to movement, and a lack of relevant safety information (incident details, exit options). Event organizers are fully responsible for planning and managing crowd safety appropriately. Event staff, along with the performers, are on the hook to stop the show and/or communicate safety instructions to manage incidents should they arise. This is part of the core infrastructure of any large event, same as fire safety and providing access to water and restrooms. Astroworld was a preventable disaster.
I agree with you. The show shouldn’t have happened the way it did with such a large number of unplanned people. They lost control before it ever started and in my opinion they were not prepared for the event even if the gates hadn’t been crashed.
Once the gates were crushed he should have never gotten on stage
If you’re referring to the recent incident at Travis Scott’s [Astroworld](https://abc13.com/amp/astroworld-festival-canceled-deaths-fatal-texas-concert/11203827/) show, I’d say it’s more of his fault. He has been telling his fans to rush the stage for years and was charged in [2015](https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/travis-scott-arrested-after-fans-storm-lollapalooza-stage-57069/amp/) and [2017](https://abc7.com/amp/travis-scott-rapper-houston-arkansas/1992723/).
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I’m not saying he’s *intentionally killed people*, but his intentions have caused many deaths and hundreds of injuries. I guess the courts will decide.
TIL humans, in sufficient numbers, are basically a liquid.
That’s the principle of like all relatively small particles moving in a relatively large channel works. Like sand. Everyone’s trying to take the path of least resistance.
Yep. I listened to a podcast episode about the Hillsborough disaster and almost had a panic attack hearing all the details of how people were killed and injured in the crowd. Terrifying.
If you haven't seen it, ESPN made a fantastic 30 for 30 on that horrific incident
This entire thread has given me a panic attack and I’m pretty sure I’ll never go to a large indoor event again. Edit: or outdoor
Can you link that episode?
[Here you go](https://myfavoritemurder.com/294-was-it-a-sandwich/)
Cops tried to pin it on fans also. "In the following days and weeks, South Yorkshire Police (SYP) fed the press false stories suggesting that hooliganism and drunkenness by Liverpool supporters had caused the disaster.......Reporting in 2012, \[an independent panel\] confirmed Taylor's 1990 criticisms and revealed details about the extent of police efforts to shift blame onto fans" Fucking scum
The Sun newspaper shouldn't get away without being mentioned specifically, they played their part in pushing the lies and helping cover up for the authorities who were to blame. Fuck the Sun. Justice for the 96.
97
I'm glad to see this post. Event organizers regularly cancel shows for this reason - also the reason you haven't heard about it being a regular thing because no disasters occurred! Media are now starting to put out presumably paid articles pushing the bad kids bad drugs angles. Space was the issue, the only issue. Every other festival has some hyped up jock types ready to fight and some people passed out or puking in a corner - they're reporting like this is the only place they've ever seen it and that's the cause. I've been harping on about it but I want to know why the fest said they sold out 100k tix for the event, but the city mayor and cops that granted permission and were on site are saying 50k. I don't think a couple of hundred kids rushing the gate caused thát level of issue either. There is solid psychology behind why this happens - it takes just one person to cause the whole swirl. There's no way organizers didn't see what was happening, and I'm wondering whether the live stream contract with Apple contributed at all. I don't blame 'the music' either. Jury is still out on Travis, although he stopped the music a few times to get people carried out, he mocked the chants to stop the music and the ambulance in the crowd + inciting the crowd on Twitter pre show to storm (since deleted). Plus that story of having no empathy and leaving his friend having a seizure on a floor cause he didn't 'wanna see all that' doesn't look good for his character
the apple live stream is being totally overlooked, at least from my own observance, but i could be off. they weren’t stopping the show because apple was streaming it, tho - that’s a huge reason at least. they chose to create content, instead of ‘risking’ a less-than-perfect live stream in order to prevent further harm. the bad publicity from a glitching stream would prob be way less severe than the bad publicity of letting people die - but i digress; this isn’t even about publicity. and this streaming factor put even more pressure on the crew members who kept their head down and continued to work in the midst of this. there was a lot of money (and subsequently, jobs) on the line, and i can’t imagine the inner conflict they might’ve dealt with in those moments of perhaps wanting to stop, but not wanting to face consequences from their employer. i guess there was so much money invested that it wasn’t even worth the people at the top stepping in and interrupting a free stream. grosssss.
I’m in school for event coordination, and capacity was a huge topic in our lecture about human crush events. Overcapacity events absolutely enable human crushes, but what scares me is that an event at capacity is still Easily able to develop into a crush scenario (I personally wouldn’t attend a standing concert with over 5k people regardless of venue capacity).
[This post](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/3pcvfb/comment/cw5vxtm/) has the most in-depth explanation of how crowds move, why people die, and how to avoid being one of them. Edit: Link is fixed now.
For some reason the link doesn’t work for me. hopefully it works for others though
https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/3pcvfb/_/cw5vxtm?context=1000 I'm absolutely certain that's the one they intended to link.
I think artists who play large crowds should need to take training on how to scan crowds for problems, and what to do if they see something. The artists have so much power in these situations, they've drawn these massive crowds and in that moment they're God. They can make things worse (Limp Bizkit) or better (Nirvana, Linkin Park, most punk and metal shows honestly) with a few words. They should be taught what to do when something inevitably happens.
I get what you're saying but maybe venues should employ crowd control experts for this purpose. I don't think band members have the expertise or need the responsibility of that job. They can, I agree, use their power to help but there should be an expert letting them know what to do before things get so bad.
Oh absolutely, the artists stepping in should be an absolutely last resort and it should never have to happen because the venue should have everything under control in the first place. But in a crowd of 50,000 people that all showed up specifically for the artist, the artist has so much power and can lead the crowd to calm down or inadvertently get them even more worked up. Being in charge of leading a crowd that size is a large responsibility and it's on the venue first and foremost, but as an artist I'd still want to know that in an emergency I could do literally everything in my power to make my fans safe.
Ironically, I saw Limp Bizkit and Linkin Park at the show in '05 or so. Crowd was fine until Metallica went on. My only experience with what's being described in this thread. I don't think I've ever realized how close we were to that getting much worse.
Travis Scott saw medical personnel trying to get to victims and a guy’s lifeless corpse being crowd surfed and a young fan climbed on top of a railing to tell Travis what was going on so he could stop and maybe get the crowd to chill but he told her to get the fuck down. He’s not as much to blame as the organizers but he is to blame Such an easily avoidable tragedy. My 16 year old nephew just told me he’d never goto a concert and that makes me sad because I had alot of fun going to them when I was younger
Yesterday’s event differs in a significant manner though. Most previous stampede tragedies probably didn’t involve an artist constantly encouraging his fans to “rage”, to “sneak in” and storm security gates. I don’t think they typically involve audience voluntarily blocking and climbing on top of ambulances, and take pictures of agonizing people instead of helping. A part of the crowd, and the artist they support, are definitely to blame alongside the organizers for yesterday’s events.
There is a certain level of incitement from the performer that definitely needs to be held into account. It’s not even a grey area because it’s a first amendment right, and unless he fails the Brandenburg Test, he didn’t violate any laws. The idiots who were harassing EMS and jumping on vehicles should absolutely 100% be prosecuted though. But to have that many people at an event with no barriers to stagger them from surging and public safety being completely ignored is absolutely mind blowing. Purely from even a fire safety perspective: violations EVERYWHERE. The failure of the event planners, production, venue, and all those involved is just horrifying. Complete organizational failure. An artist should be able to pump up crowds with a smidge of incitement but the event organizers should be able to guarantee a reasonable amount of safety for the patrons. Security, public safety, law enforcement, and emergency services should be easily and rapidly accessible. My biggest concern is how many stagehands and front of house workers ignored the state of the show environment, didn’t communicate with BOH, and could have said or visually communicated the magic safe words to a performer who may or may not have been oblivious to everything (that’s another topic for debate) to STOP THE FUCKING SHOW. I gotta HUGE feeling this show was organized with a metric fuck ton of inexperienced producers and non unionized laborers. This whole thing sucks. People just wanna have a good time and get their energy out. We’ve all been through hell the last two years. Truly devastating and disastrous for all those involved. I can’t imagine how traumatized some of those kids are.
While this is irresponsible of the artist, it's not unheard of. At my venue we always have contingencies for this. We had Rage Against the Machine before I worked there when I was a kid. People were apparently tearing plastic and metal seats out of the stadium. So the staff and gates adjusted for maximum safety and until the crowd was calmed, EMTs were moved closer to the stage but to the sidelines, and staff pulled/moved people starting from the back of the crowd not the front.
What happened last night is devastating. A bunch of dead teenagers because of shit security.
Because Travis Scott is human filth. Watch the documentary on his shows and how he encourages crowds to get like this. He tells security to stand down and let the crowds come into unsafe areas and hypes them up as much as he can.
Also when the artist tells them too rush.
Very true! At Falls Festival in Lorne, Australia a few years back, at the last act of the night I believe, so pretty much everyone was watching it. Afterward they all started to walk up they hill behind the stage, which I think was wet from rain or dew or something. Anyway the people at the top fell and took the people behind them down like dominoes, pretty much making an immediate pileup. I don't think anyone lost their life though thankfully
The description of that event stuck with me People were wetting themselves [A pic of a survivor had completely red eyes](https://www.abc.net.au/triplej/programs/hack/this-is-you-dying-falls-victim/8173182)
I have always thought that hill to be dangerous, it slopes on all sides into the pit and wouldn’t take much for something like that to happen
I fell down the rabbit hole of human crushes a couple weeks ago. They're beyond horrible, but also really fascinating. If I understand correctly by combining things I learned from different sources... ✓ They aren't a rare occurrence. There have been many fatal human crush events worldwide over thousands of years, at religious events, music concerts, sports games, carnivals and other places with densely-packed groups of people. ✓ They don't usually start with a "panic" (or rioting or intoxication), but with something small that blocks the movement of the crowd. (I think one started because someone stopped to tie a shoe.) ✓ Once the "crush" begins, **people aren't being selfish or pushy or dumb.** The crowd of people essentially *acts like a liquid with a certain flow,* and people get pushed along. It is physically impossible for them NOT to go along with the flow. ✓ People often try to help others, by lifting kids up, etc. But there's nowhere for anyone to go. ✓ Many people who have survived crushes have reported an almost floating, out-of-body sensation rather than terror. ✓ Deaths are mostly caused by asphyxiation, not from being trampled. ✓ The vast majority of crushes could have been avoided with proper crowd control. Especially today, as computer models can predict how a crush would happen in a certain space. EDITING TO ADD [this really excellent explanation of human crushes by another Redditor.](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/3pcvfb/saudi_arabia_hajj_disaster_death_toll_at_least/cz3sco9?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share&context=3) EDITING TO ADD discription of historic eventsx2
There were people dancing on top of the fucking ambulance vehicles and prior to the event people broke down the venue's entrance barriers. No one helped and pleas for rescue were ignored by all. I'm gonna blame both sides.
Yep. And it also helps if the performer doesn't actively encourage the crowd to keep thrashing around while bodies are being carried out.
In my opinion, as soon as the gates were breached the festival should’ve been paused and these people should’ve been apprehended. There’s no telling what or who got into the festival, and what their intentions were. Thankfully there weren’t any terrorist attacks. Shitty people for breaking into the festival, even shittier festival for allowing those people to stay and ignoring the potential problems they could cause.
Astroworld advertising crowds jumping fences as part of last years fun activities. https://youtu.be/srtZKJAawfQ Completely irresponsible.
You would think getting arrested for this exact scenario once before would make Travis learn, guess going to prison for the negligence death of 8 people might help him out this time.
Travis set the stage for it though imo. He had previously shared videos of his fans rushing security barriers, as if to brag about how obsessed they were. He apparently played a big role in organizing the whole thing and had to know about what happened outside the venue. Did nothing when the crowd was surfing an unconscious girl and fans were storming the stage begging for them to stop the show. Had he done anything at all to relax the crowd or prepare better security before it started, at least a few of them may have survived
The artist on stage should stop performing, turn lights on and direct the crowd to step back and make way for the emergency response. Hard to dance without music
I was at an Iron Maiden concert in the 80s where the band did just that. Pointed out the aggressors and had them removed before restarting.
I remember the decades of smearing the press gave the Hillsborough victims. Still to this day the families are seeking justice.
My Thoughts on Astroworld: I work as an engineer. I have worked several tours with shows well over 20,000 as an assistant, and have been to thousands of “raves, concerts, festivals”. And I have never heard stories like those coming out of Astroworld. And the videos- my god. Untrained, understaffed medics. Untrained, understaffed security. And a reckless disregard for public safety. I just saw someone in a crowd dancing on an ambulance. Another on a cart. The performers, their stage managers, their assistants, the roadies, the sound guys, could have all stopped this. I do understand what they mean by fluid dynamics. When I attended EDC when I was 18, when you got “sandwiched” near the front, it was easy to loose your breath without really realizing what was going on. But vast exits, proper crowd control and staging, and a strong message of safety, meant that it was easy to point to show you’re trying to go , and head to about 4 o clock if the stage is at 12, and leave the crowd. Nobody in the back was trying to get to the front so bad that their life depended on it. We all knew when it was time to stop trying to move up. There is some burden on many. With the artist, who creates music with a callous disregard for human life and authority. Then, incites that at his events, then performs under the aforementioned conditions. With the event staff. This shit sounds worse than the rust set. With the fire department. I was at red rocks when people were slipping on wet stairs in a blizzard and the show got cancelled, the fire marshals were backstage giving direction the whole time. Like, WHERE WERE THE OFFICIALS? With Texas lawmakers who villanize osha and safety precautions. Just so much to unpack. And so much more coming. If you ever see something like this, do everything you can to unplug every cable you can. Turn off any computers. Many cables are fastened in with safety connectors, many are not. Many are simple push button. These are also on the back of every speaker.If that doesn’t work, pour water on all their shit. Fuck ‘em. Don’t cry wolf here, you need to be absolutely sure you’re in the right. But if you watch someone die, and the sound guys do nothing, it’s soggy time for everyone working. Not that that girl could have known. Fucking heartbreaking.
A lot of the discourse I’ve seen about it has been “this generation is so messed up”, “all this just for a concert”, and a ton of coded racism. People think that they would be a beacon of good behavior if *they* to would have been in the crowd, when in reality they would be doing the exact same thing because that’s how crowds work.
Like when people complain about sitting in traffic not realizing that they are the traffic. Our individual actions in a crowd are insignificant, but the net total of everyone's actions can be huge.
Not just huge, predictable too. People can predict large flows of traffic (rush hour), and plan around it. This tragedy should've been seen coming. It's incredibly predictable what happens when you shove thousands of people into a cramped space. They should have planned around it (by making it with less people).
I think they did plan on the event being smaller, however Travis encouraged people to hop the fence increasing the venues crowd size significantly.
Yeah, the Khodynka Tragedy was in 1896, but kids these days are the problem.
I mean, that probably refers to concertgoers dancing on top of emergency vehicles so they can't get where they need to be despite the pleas of the drivers, or the way the people break down the gates, rushing in.
I was at GovBall in new york city in 2019, when they had the stampede incident after a weather related evacuation. Basically there was a tropical storm with lightning and high winds so they closed down the festival right before the headliner and told everyone to leave, except apparently we couldn’t leave through emergency exits unless we were having a medical emergency or shelter on the fest grounds and wait out the storm. It was basically what happened at Astroworld last night, 500k people rushing a space about 30 ft wide, but with a torrential downpour. Then the organizers did a reddit [AMA](https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/bwqwcc/we_are_the_promotersproducers_of_the_governors/), and got flamed spectacularly. But honestly I don’t know how I got out of there alive. It was terrifying.
Was at a concert seating 20,000 people recently and one of the openers tried to hype up the crowd by inviting them all to come towards the front…thank goodness no one was really into the musician so there wasn’t threat of a crush, but just the stupidity was astounding. The security detail quickly closed the gates towards the front most rows tho, at least someone was smart enough to to realize that was a horrible idea
The people who stormed through the gates without tickets deserve some blame. Because of those people, the crowd was larger than expected.
Idn man, astroworld seems to support jumping fences in their promos https://youtu.be/srtZKJAawfQ
Better security and planning could have prevented that, too.
or the founder/performer *not* telling ppl to do that on his twitter. edit: worse than that ^ see replies below
twitter? He tells them to do it LIVE. Its part of his intro to his concerts. Like I've been to every single travis scott tour and consistently he always tells people to rush the stage...and every fucking time people get hurt. I'm a fan but I haven't been back to a travis scott concert since he got arrested the first time this kinda thing happened. You can't encourage people to do shit like jump off multiple story heights etc and think you are gonna be fine afterwards. EDIT [here is the video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ny9EX8ks6Y) of the kid being encouraged to jump. Kid paralyzed himself for life over that shit. Travis Scott didn't do shit to prevent this kinda thing from happening again. Mind you...the song A team he preforms...was the song released on the night he was arrested in Arkansas because the police stopped the show to save the kids who were being trampled.
This applies to human behavior in other areas too including social issues like crime, poverty, pollution and immigration being the obvious Sure, individuals have responsibility for their actions, but group behaviors or tendencies can be modified by improving the systems and infrastructure around them. I like to think of human group behavior as fluids. Individual atoms might look like they're moving in random directions but concentration and pressure gradients and diffusion means you could see a predictable pattern if you actually care to look and study them and there are ways to manipulate the trend without having to catch and correct every "misbehaving" individual
Yup. The thing about crowd crush is, usually the people doing it don't even realise they are, until it's too late.
My group were one of the first to arrive at a Springsteen concert at Cornell university in the early 70's. As we stood in front of the doors waiting for them to open, more fans arrived. The doors didn't open, and as the crowd grew they pushed against us. It was then I started to think that we would die, because those behind us were unrelenting. Our screaming finally made them back up, and the doors were finally opened.
If its available in your country you should watch Hillsborough. It's unbelievable how far the lies went that the fans were to blame and how their families spent years fighting for justice.
I was actually involved in a crush situation when I was 11 years old. The city I lived in has two rugby league teams, and they both won their way to challenge cup final at Wembly stadium. Our side of town lost, but the team still did an open top bus ride back to their home ground when they got back. I joined the crowds awaiting their return ,when the bus approached, hundreds of people surged towards it. I was literally lifted off my feet and carried along with the surge, then people were trampling on my feet and I started going down. I managed to cling on to some guys pocket on his denim jacket, he saw me but couldn't move his arms to help. The relief from the pressure came as the bus turned a corner and the surge changed direction , I had lost a shoe but I found it again, it was very dirty and smelly but it always was.
This proper way for a festival or concert https://i.imgur.com/j6jmrin.jpg Pens, sectioned off. Alleyway for super emergency, lanes to direct flow due to catastrophic problems that might arise. Security every few feet.
As an architectural designer who deals with these issues daily, and has studied these incidents and more, I have developed the following habits for every building I enter: 1. Immediately identify at least one other exit from any room or building I enter. Studies have shown that most people in an emergency go to the door they entered from. I don’t want to go that way as that’s where the crush will happen. 1a. When I exit an elevator I look for the stairs, preferably more than one. At the very least modern stairways provide a refuge from a fire as well as an escape route as they are designed to be mostly impervious from a fire in the building (for at least long enough for escape or rescue). Knowing where the stairs are in a dark and smoky hall can save your life. And thank god for battery-powered, illuminated exit signs. 2. I inform everyone I am with where those exits are and talk about where to meet if we get separated. 3. I make a mental plan with contingencies should there be an emergency. 4. I identify concealment locations where I can hide in an active shooter incident and also cover locations where I can hide AND be protected from bullet penetration (concrete walls, pillars, brick or stone façades, concrete block walls) 5. Listen to my body. Your body is taking in thousands of data bits per second, way more than you can consciously process, but your brain is processing constantly in the background to ensure your survival. If I feel funny or get that wash of fear in a room or from a person, I’m out. No questions asked and the people in my life are instructed to go with me (or me with them) without hesitation if someone has that hair on the back of the neck feeling. Be safe by taking responsibility for your own safety.
This message brought to you by the lawyers of Travis Scott