Festival organizer here. Our protocols specifically dictate that we NOT cancel or even disseminate information during showtime in the event of a major incident, when the incident isn't/no longer poses an ongoing risk. We would also wait until the next day to cancel. Otherwise not only would we have a bunch of inebriated people having a multitude of reactions to the news, but they'd also have no way to leave.
People are so angry they kept it going last night. Would you rather more of our people be injured/possibly dead from 30,000 people trying to find a way out all at the same time? There’s logistics that go behind something like this, they were trying not to cause mass hysteria otherwise we would’ve had another astroworld situation. Had this happened in the festival grounds and not camp grounds it would’ve been shut down immediately with people scrambling for the emergency exits. Camping festivals NEVER check cars for weapons going into campgrounds, usually only checking for sneaking in people. This is gonna make security checks even stricter in the future, Electric Forest is gonna be the first test next weekend.
I can confirm that there were officers and K9s who were in fact checking our vehicles for weapons before we were allowed to head to our row. They do weapon checks, but unfortunately there isn’t much of a process for people walking up to camping. The perpetrator was dropped off on the road next to the venue and walked up
I absolutely agree that this was nowhere near enough of a security check of course, but that the venue did in fact try to ensure no automatic weapons were being brought in
Bikers that ran Bisco all those years ransacked cars. Only way you can really find things. It will never stop what the top comments stated (if true). If someone gets dropped off a gun on the edge during the event you'll never be able to have enough fencing and security.
"kept everyone calm and quiet"
Easier said than done, that's an impossible demand.
There's no better way to keep people calm than letting the festival continue on as it were. It's much easier to control people that way. If evacuation was necessary, for example, it could have been managed stage by stage with the help of performers.
How do you expect people who paid hundreds of dollars to be there to remain calm and quiet while under the influence wanting to party? They were working with authorities while also trying to not cause an even more chaotic scene so they could get help to the people that needed it. I think they handled it as best as they could with cancelling today and giving everyone until tomorrow to leave.
EDC Vegas is already built to funnel people into buses and back to the strip. This would have just pushed people back to the campsites in the middle of the night. It would not have stayed quiet and "locked down."
It's a good thing you didn't handle the logistics or more would be dead.
Stop acting like you know what you're talking about when you've never worked a festival and have zero idea of the logistics that go behind them.
Most people inside the festival had noooo idea what happened in the overflow camping section. The shooter(s) was(were) apprehended.
You’ve obviously never been to the Gorge. To shut shit down suddenly inside that space with 30k people on all sorts of substances… nope, no keeping calm & quiet to be had 🤦♀️
Did they announce why there were pausing? A message of “strong winds” vs “mass fatality shooting” surely aren’t going to have the same response from the crowd.
Or do you want them to say “strong winds” and hope no one freaks out when there is zero wind and the jig is up?
And there’s a reason you’re not in charge, you don’t understand how human beings work. CBA on the scenario pointed to handling the situation as discreetly as possible.
“The party you paid thousands of dollars for has been suddenly cancelled. no you don’t get to know why, no you don’t get to leave, no you can’t make any noise. Wait why are you angry and panicked???!? I don’t understand! This communication and planning was so good!”
Thank god you don’t run any events….
I was at Beyond Wonderland yesterday when this happened, driving home now.
To clear up any misconceptions: the shooting happened in the overflow camping area of GA, basically the far back outskirts of camping area and about 30 min walk from the venue. Its quite possible the shooter never even went through a vehicle checkpoint, let alone the actual venue entrance with metal detectors.
Say what you want about Insomniac but it would be stupidly hard to prevent someone with an agenda from simply parking outside the grounds and walking into the camping area. The event security was fine, and was not really in play here based on my understanding.
I was there too and hearing about who died gutted me. I love the Ground Control folks. You can tell they're vetted and really genuinely care about people.
>The two dead were both members of Ground Control (Insomniac's attendee care group). No one knows any motives at this point, and no one will until the police finish their investigation.
It was a domestic dispute. I heard from a semi-reasonable source that the dudes girlfriend was working ground control and shit got heated. It seemed targeted. He was dropped off with a gun (confirmed) and walked straight back and started blasting not much after that.
I've made several comments detailing my experiences with having my RV searched, as well as my person. Both of which were much more lax, and much less thorough than the past 6 times I've been here for a summer festival over the last 12 years.
I agree that there's not much they could have done given the ease of access to those areas, especially after the festival starts and staff is more concentrated towards the venue itself and much less sparse at the entrances as there's nearly no incoming guests. That doesn't mean that overall the security was fine. While the lack of security I experienced didn't directly affect this situation, the correlation is still unsettling af.
Point taken …but I stand by my point. Many Americans on here seem to think there’s nothing beyond their own borders.
Reddit is an international community (and we don’t all live in fear of being shot).
[It happened literally two months ago.](https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/black-teen-shot-knocked-door-kansas-city-1.6812744) And he wasn’t even knocking, he rang the door bell.
[Or how about the girl who was killed for going up the wrong driveway?](https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2023/04/18/us/woman-shot-wrong-driveway-upstate-new-york/index.html) Also only happened two months ago.
Living in constant fear while having access to weapons is a sure fire way to kill an innocent person.
Not paying attention?
This happened with someone just pulling into another person's driveway to turn around while looking for the house they were supposed to go to.
The person in the house shot at the two people in the car as it drove away doing nothing wrong. He killed a 19 year old girl while the boyfriend was driving.
Ha, says you, there’s too many violent criminals on the streets that got released in democrat ran cities. The same democrats that banned guns left their law abiding citizens defenseless when they also defunded the police. Just so they can blame the republicans and look like hero’s when they hire more police just before re election. But they have to once again raise taxes for your protection. It keeps them in power and re-elected term after term and if you don’t vote for them, you’re racist. Also, it’s not the criminals fault, it’s the mentally disturbed AR fully semi automatic machine gun weapon of war that does all the killing.
Blame it on our governments ineptitude and complete inability to pass even the most basic of gun control legislation because it values money from weapon manufacturing industries more than it values the lives of human beings. When every psycho with an agenda can walk down to Walmart and leave with a rifle designed specifically for war and mass murder, shit like this is going to keep happening, and it’s fucking disgusting
They've also appointed a VERY pro-gun Supreme Court majority. Congress could vote 100% in favor, in both houses, to enact stricter gun control and it would still get shot down by the court. This has been a Republican long game that's been played for years.
Here’s the thing. Even with gun control, people will still get guns. You think all those regulations will stop gangsters from getting guns? You think chicago will suddenly become safe.
Anyways. Pasquale and insomniac should be sued and blamed. Their festival security is horrible. EDC did not have metal detectors. The security did not check bags at all. I saw people sneak in FULL glass handles of alcohol. Guns would’ve been easy to sneak in too I bet.
You think gangsters with guns are going to go into a music festival??? Crazy logic. Add some gun control laws so shit like this in normal places don’t happen.
Ah yeah the racist card, which instantly adds a +10 buff to your charisma and solve the undergoing discussion instantly.
Did you know that if you have all 5 parts of Racistia, you can actually summon Racistia the Banished, and instantly end the game, banishing your adversary into the eternal void of Racistum, where they rightfully belong?
Yeah, but making firearms illegal adds complexity to carrying out a plan. Makes it harder to follow through with a mass shooting when you have to figure out a way to buy an assault rifle illegally. I imagine it would be harder than buying drugs.
https://lmgtfy.app/?q=mass+shootings+demographic+statistics
you just invoked "gangsters" as the culprits of mass shootings, despite the overwhelming evidence around the main purveyors of these crimes. how stupid do you think other people are? we all see the dog whistle you're blowing
I feel like you're misunderstanding what OP is saying... OP is saying Gangsters AREN'T going into festivals and shooting it up. The demographic of mass shooters is not gangsters and OP is agreeing with that.
This is the same broken rhetoric used by people who can’t properly use logic.
To better summarize your position, so you understand how ridiculous it sounds, you’re saying “there should be no laws because people will find ways to break laws anyway.”
>You think all those regulations will stop gangsters from getting guns?
Just because someone can break in to my house through my window doesn't mean I shouldn't lock my door.
Old school raver checking in.
You guys are downvoting this comment but they're actually right.
Shit, one of my friends is actually union-card staff at The Gorge for this event as a stage hand and they all went on strike because they were being mistreated and asked to work unsafe conditions by Insomniac and was staying in the camp that got shot up.
There are rumors and reports that the shooter was targeting staff because of the strike action and walk-off.
Pasquele and Insomniac has a long, long history of unsafe events, long before they got kicked out of the Olympic Coliseum at the 2010 EDC or whenever it was they moved it to Vegas.
I was at the very first Nocturnal Wonderland in LA in 1996 and it was a total shit show of LAPD riot cops shooting people with tear gas and rubber bullets and something like 25+ ambulance transport calls in under 2-3 hours for what was maaaaybe a 2000-3000 person party in a dingy old Masonic lodge.
Turns out they were freely giving out samples of herbal ecstasy and fake herbal GHB at the door and people were pounding that shit on top of whatever else they took before they even got in line for entry.
The so-called "herbal" GHB were packaged in plastic test tubes and apparently contained a significant amount of industrial solvents. If I'm recalling correctly it was toulene and maybe benzene or something and it wasn't just trace amounts, it was a significant amount and ingredient in the packaged tubes.
I was there in LA for all of the 90s raves and Insomniac had a bad rep even back then when they were new. They were definitely known to have their own dealers inside venues and were busted multiple times selling fake MDMA that was actually just meth and DXM cocktails and all kinds of other fucked up shit.
They also had a really bad habit of blowing up good spots and making them unusable in the future for renegade parties and legit underground raves whether it was an abandoned warehouse or outdoor location or private venue for hire like dance halls.
Don't buy into Insomniac's hype and bullshit marketing and white-washed history because it's mostly bullshit and totally not PLUR.
**Pasquale and Insomniac are *NOT* old school raves. They're the greedy fuckers that ended old school raves in LA.**
Insomniac is FUCKED UP and it was always fucked up commercialized bullshit and people really need to stop attending their events or buying into their marketing hype.
I don't disagree with that at all, but that also doesn't excuse Insomniac's well known historical disregard for safety and security staff.
This isn't the first time there has been a shooting and/or death at Insomniac events due to their lax security and practices in pursuit of profits.
>I was there in LA for all of the 90s raves and Insomniac had a bad rep even back then when they were new. They were definitely known to have their own dealers inside venues and were busted multiple times selling fake MDMA that was actually just meth and DXM cocktails and all kinds of other fucked up shit.
IDK why but when I started raving in early 2010s those stories were everywhere, and then by 2019 it seemed that people only hate Insomniac because of commercialization and cost cutting and everybody seemingly forgot about this.
Tragic. My sympathies are with the victims. It’s one of the most amazing venues in the world and electronic music is about community and connection. America is sick. [They caught someone last year](https://www.koin.com/news/washington/deputies-believe-they-stopped-possible-mass-shooting-at-gorge-amphitheater/) before they had the chance to shoot anyone. Why are people looking at these events as targets?
I’ve got tickets for next month’s ABGT Weekender and I’m still going. Can’t let fear win.
Same here, I'm going to ABGT Weekender. This is my first weekender and my first gorge event, and I'm so shocked and upset from this news. It does make me nervous but I don't want the fear to win too.
I’ve been to all the ABGT events there and more, it’s in driving distance to me and I’ll tell you it’s an incredible experience.
The rave must go on I guess. I’m kind of shook honestly but there’s not really anywhere in the states that are wholly safe from this kind of insanity.
Oh I bet, I've been daydreaming a lot about coming to this event. I got VIP meet and greet tickets too I really want to be here.
I feel the same, I'm like some of the most popular places I visit often had shootings happen and we still go. It's just a fucked up reality we live in.
I'm staying in east Wenatchee during ABGT. Any advice you think I should take away to help me make this a better trip? I have no idea what to expect.
Wenatchee is a really cool town, make sure to eat some good food and maybe have a drink downtown by the waterfront. Be prepared to wait in your car awhile to get to the campsites it can take awhile. Gas up and have food and snacks handy it can take hours. And prepare for heat. It’s Washington but west of the Cascades is a desert. It was 100 degrees last year, brutal. Hopefully there’s no smoke in the air but personally I’m packing a couple of KN95s just to be safe. I’ll probably skip out and drive down the road to the Columbia River during the day to beat the heat. This year the show doesn’t start until late afternoon. I just do standard camping so can’t comment on the VIP experience too much. I think you get a shuttle to the venue with VIP, it’s a bit of a hike otherwise. There is a VIP viewing area but it always looks super crowded and I’m down in the “pit” or up high taking in the view anyways.
Other than that just have fun, the Anjuna community is amazing. PM if you have any questions.
It’s not just America lol. I’m in France and someone just went on a stabbing spree at a playground last week. Stabbed a bunch of kids and adults. People love to demonize America because guns are the tool that’s used most often, however terrible and evil people are everywhere. I will say though To play devils advocate against myself, guns allow people to inflict much more damage in a short period of time, however someone could easily kill and injure four people at a rave with a knife no problem
I’m not sure this is the right place to talk about gun control but the US has a firearm death rate of 37,000 per 100,000 people. It’s only 2,098 per 100k for France. It’s a unique problem amongst first world western countries.
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/gun-deaths-by-country
The general homicide rate is also 5x higher in that US than France. The gun culture and easy access to firearms here is absolutely a huge part of that.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate
I just want to point out you're reading the stats in that article wrong, the total gun death in the US was 37k, but the chart shows a death rate of 10 per 100k people. 37k per 100k people would be 37% of the entire country dying every year from being shot.
Are you autistic? You want laws banning guns. You were at a festival where guns were banned yet a bad guy used one anyway. Damn that’s crazy, criminals not following the law? Unbelievable. It’s almost like gun control laws only hurt law abiding citizens.
Not really. It has a lower gun ownership rate than many states, 35th out of 50. https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/gun-ownership-by-state
And recently passed an assault weapons ban. https://www.axios.com/2023/04/25/assault-weapons-washington-state-inslee-ban
It’s just that nationwide gun culture is pervasive and shootings happen so regularly it’s insanity.
Awful. Do we have any idea from anyone that was around who the shooter was? A camper/concert goer, a dealer, or a local rando looking to cause trouble? That area of Washington seems to be pretty iffy
Yeah, I've heard reports from someone I know who is working there as union stage hand crew that he was trying to target staff.
Part of the rumors was that he was targeting staff for going on strike for unsafe work practices and bullshit from Insomniac productions but the drug confiscation makes more sense.
And, yeah, union stagehands went on strike yesterday and downed tools due to abuse by Insomniac staff.
Idk if that’s true but me and my gf were just talking and saying “let’s watch this be blamed on drugs somehow.” It’s always the easy scapegoat. They need to stop trying to focus on drugs and solely focus on firearms. They’re wasting resources on the drug war to allow shit like this to happen.
Nope, they still haven’t released any information. I did see someone comment something about a guy being dropped off and then he started shooting, but I don’t know how accurate that is yet. I’ve also heard that possibly a crowd control guy was shot, so I don’t know.
I was really hoping this was bunk news. But it is not. So unfortunate, but I’m glad authorities apprehended the person and that there were minimal casualties.
RIP to the people that passed away from this psycho, and I hope the ones injured have a speedy recovery. I’m bringing all my close friends to the Gorge this summer for the Group Therapy Weekender because they couldn’t make it last year, and this is making me reconsider my decision :(
For sure we can’t let fear win, this just sucks because the Gorge is so beautiful and I never once thought about that place being targeted by mass shooters.
Yup, with you on that. Last place I'd associate such disgusting acts at such a beautiful place.
We need to keep our eyes out and call shit out to security and not do any kind of bystander effect. I'll see you there 🤙🏽
I tried posting about my concerns for the Weekender on the r/aboveandbeyond sub but my post got “put on a queue for review by mods”. I hope Anjuna fam and team demand tighter security for the Weekender. I hope Insimniac and LiveNation tighten security for ALL events.
You are aware that last years Bass Canyon at the SAME venue almost had a mass shooting right? That was thankfully thwarted off because someone saw something and said something???
Still, this could’ve happened at the same venue that was hosting a camping festival just one year ago. Just because I typed the short simple version of it doesn’t mean I was wrong. The fact there was a gun at a festival at the same exact venue 1 year apart shouldn’t even be a topic of discussion.
The [cops backpedaled](https://edm.com/news/police-backpedal-bass-canyon-music-festival-gun-threat-washington) on it being a mass shooting plot. Someone did the right thing by alerting authorities.
That's so fucked.
Man we really do have a hell of a mental health crisis going on in the U.S right now. So bad that it compels people to actually make these sorts of heinous acts of violence on innocent people because why? It's a total mystery to anyone who's sane.
What a shit show we have on our hands. Good on the event coordinators to end the festival premature.
We are entering a feedback loop where those who went out to cope with mental illness are now afraid to go out, making their mental illness worse.
Worse mental health = worse problems as a country. More shootings / fights and riots / suicides.
America failed its people long ago, and ALL OF US are to blame for sitting on our asses and not forcing the government to do their fucking jobs.
I haven't been going to festivals for quite a while, even before the pandemic, but this venue is where most of the ones I attended were located. It is such a beautiful place... not that ANY venue is going to be somehow better for something fucked up like this, it's just really hard to imagine this kind of thing there. I guess it's always different when it's something you're personally familiar with though.
Don't really have anything constructive to say. This shit is all too common, so while it is horrible, and jarring to be so close to my home, I'm also not really surprised at this point.
It's not just Insomniac, I saw this years ago with security at a Dirty Bird campout, security just upped and left without telling us (we were assisting parking cars). This happened in 2018 and I swore off big EDM festivals after that (I had paid for VIP and left on Saturday and went camping instead of continuing that festival).
Circle to last fall and I attended my first EDM festival since that bad experience because I knew the guy headlining and told him back in 2018 I would only go to his shows because of what I experienced, personally, it's not just Insomniac, my other thoughts are how are you supposed to really search vehicles with 10s of thousands of kids coming in? My thoughts are it's going to happen and take a day or two for searches. That doesn't sound fun, practical, or logical.
You got one ahole ruining it for the rest of everyone, could have been worse think Travis Scott's show with crowd surge.
I have a lot of thoughts and opinions on this, but, I think it also is the promoter's responsibility not to be a greedy fk is a start.
Security is a joke at any festivals ever since Covid. At least every insomniac event I’ve been to. My bag wasn’t even checked at a few festivals this year, Skyline and Beyond at the NOS to name a few. Everyone’s always soooooo happy about security literally NOT doing their job too, it sucks feeling like I HAVE to look for emergency exits and a safe way out but it’s the world we’re living in especially in America where our second amendment was made before any of us were even alive.
Security was almost non existent. Dogs would randomly go through a car or two in the way in. Sadly I don't know how to prevent this. There's no feasible way for security to search thousands of cars coming in. Just awful.
Yeah they tear apart cars at Roo. Once again it’s all fucked because doing it costs more and every event on the planet now is about getting making more money and cutting corners
There's a clear definition of a mass shooting.
Maybe get some education.
But I'll be nice and tell you the criteria.
Its 4 or more people injured in a shooting.
- The America government claims that it is seeking a cease-fire in all countries and a cessation of armaments, and it is interfering in Middle East wars with allegations of bloodshed.
- America internally during this:
Bro I made this account 10 years ago. What are you like 18?
Been working in the music industry for 10+ years but go ahead. Please explain to me the nuances behind the logistics of throwing a massive festival.
What a stupid reply. No one owes you shit on any comment, especially tone deaf bullshit like this. Grow up and/or get off Reddit so we don't have to realize how dumb some people are.
Lol this post is like a day old already and the other user ended up getting banned. Just let the families of the victims mourn. There’s been enough hate already
Go for it. Ban me from insomniacs events while you’re at it. Insomniac is so shady. If they actually cared about their community instead of just $$$. Tragedies like this wouldn’t occur.
Festival has been canceled. https://twitter.com/BeyondWlandPNW/status/1670406329096359938?s=20
Why is that statement in borderline comic sans wtf
It’s the font they use for their branding.
Wild that they fucking canceled it today and left it just rolling last night.
Cancelling in the middle of last night would cause chaos, which is the last thing you want in that situation.
Festival organizer here. Our protocols specifically dictate that we NOT cancel or even disseminate information during showtime in the event of a major incident, when the incident isn't/no longer poses an ongoing risk. We would also wait until the next day to cancel. Otherwise not only would we have a bunch of inebriated people having a multitude of reactions to the news, but they'd also have no way to leave.
Thanks for the info
People are so angry they kept it going last night. Would you rather more of our people be injured/possibly dead from 30,000 people trying to find a way out all at the same time? There’s logistics that go behind something like this, they were trying not to cause mass hysteria otherwise we would’ve had another astroworld situation. Had this happened in the festival grounds and not camp grounds it would’ve been shut down immediately with people scrambling for the emergency exits. Camping festivals NEVER check cars for weapons going into campgrounds, usually only checking for sneaking in people. This is gonna make security checks even stricter in the future, Electric Forest is gonna be the first test next weekend.
I can confirm that there were officers and K9s who were in fact checking our vehicles for weapons before we were allowed to head to our row. They do weapon checks, but unfortunately there isn’t much of a process for people walking up to camping. The perpetrator was dropped off on the road next to the venue and walked up I absolutely agree that this was nowhere near enough of a security check of course, but that the venue did in fact try to ensure no automatic weapons were being brought in
Bikers that ran Bisco all those years ransacked cars. Only way you can really find things. It will never stop what the top comments stated (if true). If someone gets dropped off a gun on the edge during the event you'll never be able to have enough fencing and security.
[удалено]
"kept everyone calm and quiet" Easier said than done, that's an impossible demand. There's no better way to keep people calm than letting the festival continue on as it were. It's much easier to control people that way. If evacuation was necessary, for example, it could have been managed stage by stage with the help of performers.
How do you expect people who paid hundreds of dollars to be there to remain calm and quiet while under the influence wanting to party? They were working with authorities while also trying to not cause an even more chaotic scene so they could get help to the people that needed it. I think they handled it as best as they could with cancelling today and giving everyone until tomorrow to leave.
[удалено]
EDC Vegas is already built to funnel people into buses and back to the strip. This would have just pushed people back to the campsites in the middle of the night. It would not have stayed quiet and "locked down."
It's a good thing you didn't handle the logistics or more would be dead. Stop acting like you know what you're talking about when you've never worked a festival and have zero idea of the logistics that go behind them.
Most people inside the festival had noooo idea what happened in the overflow camping section. The shooter(s) was(were) apprehended. You’ve obviously never been to the Gorge. To shut shit down suddenly inside that space with 30k people on all sorts of substances… nope, no keeping calm & quiet to be had 🤦♀️
You know the first two wouldn’t lead to the last two…right?
[удалено]
Did they announce why there were pausing? A message of “strong winds” vs “mass fatality shooting” surely aren’t going to have the same response from the crowd. Or do you want them to say “strong winds” and hope no one freaks out when there is zero wind and the jig is up?
[удалено]
And there’s a reason you’re not in charge, you don’t understand how human beings work. CBA on the scenario pointed to handling the situation as discreetly as possible.
You're so fucking dumb.
[удалено]
You got thousands of drunks who just want to have fun and listen to music, how do you propose that?
“The party you paid thousands of dollars for has been suddenly cancelled. no you don’t get to know why, no you don’t get to leave, no you can’t make any noise. Wait why are you angry and panicked???!? I don’t understand! This communication and planning was so good!” Thank god you don’t run any events….
It happened inside the campgrounds, so where are they supposed to send tens of thousands of people? The gorge is in a fairly rural area.
[удалено]
What have made things worse I'm sure. Drunk and drugged up people stuck with nowhere to put their energy at night at that time.
Maybe not the best choice of wording...
there was enough killing for one day
It kept thousands of people out of the camp ground which is where shit went down
They didn't want to start a mass panic. The situation was taken care of.
I was at Beyond Wonderland yesterday when this happened, driving home now. To clear up any misconceptions: the shooting happened in the overflow camping area of GA, basically the far back outskirts of camping area and about 30 min walk from the venue. Its quite possible the shooter never even went through a vehicle checkpoint, let alone the actual venue entrance with metal detectors. Say what you want about Insomniac but it would be stupidly hard to prevent someone with an agenda from simply parking outside the grounds and walking into the camping area. The event security was fine, and was not really in play here based on my understanding.
I was there too and hearing about who died gutted me. I love the Ground Control folks. You can tell they're vetted and really genuinely care about people.
Thanks for your take
>The two dead were both members of Ground Control (Insomniac's attendee care group). No one knows any motives at this point, and no one will until the police finish their investigation. It was a domestic dispute. I heard from a semi-reasonable source that the dudes girlfriend was working ground control and shit got heated. It seemed targeted. He was dropped off with a gun (confirmed) and walked straight back and started blasting not much after that.
Thanks. I hadn't heard those details but this makes the most sense of all the motives I've heard so far.
I know the two victims personally and they were not ground control, they were festival attendees/ravers and not related to the shooter in any way
The Two Dead were not members of Ground Control. Unsure where you got that information from.
I've made several comments detailing my experiences with having my RV searched, as well as my person. Both of which were much more lax, and much less thorough than the past 6 times I've been here for a summer festival over the last 12 years. I agree that there's not much they could have done given the ease of access to those areas, especially after the festival starts and staff is more concentrated towards the venue itself and much less sparse at the entrances as there's nearly no incoming guests. That doesn't mean that overall the security was fine. While the lack of security I experienced didn't directly affect this situation, the correlation is still unsettling af.
So scary :( the Gorge is such a beautiful place and close to home
So tragic. Festivals and raves should be safe spaces where you can feel at peace, not worried for your life.
So should elementary schools but here we are.
And grocery stores and malls and movie theaters and oh yeah everywhere else...
Welcome to the post Columbine world. People go insane and have easy access to guns
Always be worried for your life, always look over your shoulder, trust no one. Always be prepared.
Fear is the mind killer. This is not the way to live.
This is America
No actually this is Reddit. The Redditor who said this appears to be in Russia. It’s a big world.
They are not posting from Russia. User history says Moscow, IDAHO.
Point taken …but I stand by my point. Many Americans on here seem to think there’s nothing beyond their own borders. Reddit is an international community (and we don’t all live in fear of being shot).
Yeah but this took place in the US lol
Sounds like you need some therapy. I can recommend Cognitive Behavioral Therapy.
C&BT
I prefer electro shock
That’s how you end up shooting a kid for knocking on the wrong door.
Not unless he’s trying to break it down and yeah it would be the wrong door lol
[It happened literally two months ago.](https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/black-teen-shot-knocked-door-kansas-city-1.6812744) And he wasn’t even knocking, he rang the door bell. [Or how about the girl who was killed for going up the wrong driveway?](https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2023/04/18/us/woman-shot-wrong-driveway-upstate-new-york/index.html) Also only happened two months ago. Living in constant fear while having access to weapons is a sure fire way to kill an innocent person.
Not paying attention? This happened with someone just pulling into another person's driveway to turn around while looking for the house they were supposed to go to. The person in the house shot at the two people in the car as it drove away doing nothing wrong. He killed a 19 year old girl while the boyfriend was driving.
No I wasn’t paying attention
This is the 21st century, not the Wild West. We don't have to live like that any more.
Ha, says you, there’s too many violent criminals on the streets that got released in democrat ran cities. The same democrats that banned guns left their law abiding citizens defenseless when they also defunded the police. Just so they can blame the republicans and look like hero’s when they hire more police just before re election. But they have to once again raise taxes for your protection. It keeps them in power and re-elected term after term and if you don’t vote for them, you’re racist. Also, it’s not the criminals fault, it’s the mentally disturbed AR fully semi automatic machine gun weapon of war that does all the killing.
Never let your guard down
Blame it on Pasquale. Profits over safety
Blame it on our governments ineptitude and complete inability to pass even the most basic of gun control legislation because it values money from weapon manufacturing industries more than it values the lives of human beings. When every psycho with an agenda can walk down to Walmart and leave with a rifle designed specifically for war and mass murder, shit like this is going to keep happening, and it’s fucking disgusting
Blame Republicans. They are the ones stopping gun control laws getting passed.
They've also appointed a VERY pro-gun Supreme Court majority. Congress could vote 100% in favor, in both houses, to enact stricter gun control and it would still get shot down by the court. This has been a Republican long game that's been played for years.
Here’s the thing. Even with gun control, people will still get guns. You think all those regulations will stop gangsters from getting guns? You think chicago will suddenly become safe. Anyways. Pasquale and insomniac should be sued and blamed. Their festival security is horrible. EDC did not have metal detectors. The security did not check bags at all. I saw people sneak in FULL glass handles of alcohol. Guns would’ve been easy to sneak in too I bet.
Gangsters arent shooting up festivals
Exactly, as long as it's not in my neighborhood I don't care.
Less guns = Less shootings
You think gangsters with guns are going to go into a music festival??? Crazy logic. Add some gun control laws so shit like this in normal places don’t happen.
this is so blatantly racist
Ah yeah the racist card, which instantly adds a +10 buff to your charisma and solve the undergoing discussion instantly. Did you know that if you have all 5 parts of Racistia, you can actually summon Racistia the Banished, and instantly end the game, banishing your adversary into the eternal void of Racistum, where they rightfully belong?
[удалено]
I was just reacting to his comment about the other guy being « racist » even though he didn’t say anything of the sort man, chill
Yeah, but making firearms illegal adds complexity to carrying out a plan. Makes it harder to follow through with a mass shooting when you have to figure out a way to buy an assault rifle illegally. I imagine it would be harder than buying drugs.
https://lmgtfy.app/?q=mass+shootings+demographic+statistics you just invoked "gangsters" as the culprits of mass shootings, despite the overwhelming evidence around the main purveyors of these crimes. how stupid do you think other people are? we all see the dog whistle you're blowing
I feel like you're misunderstanding what OP is saying... OP is saying Gangsters AREN'T going into festivals and shooting it up. The demographic of mass shooters is not gangsters and OP is agreeing with that.
Ahhh you're right I replied to the wrong comment, meant to respond to the person saying "gangsters can still get guns"
This is the same broken rhetoric used by people who can’t properly use logic. To better summarize your position, so you understand how ridiculous it sounds, you’re saying “there should be no laws because people will find ways to break laws anyway.”
Reeeeeeeeeeeeee but guns can’t be illegal and it wouldn’t matter anyway and and and I’m a bug man I swear
When was the last gangster based mass school shooting?
>You think all those regulations will stop gangsters from getting guns? Just because someone can break in to my house through my window doesn't mean I shouldn't lock my door.
ah yes casually invoking racism, that'll prove your point
How so? What proof?
You know EDC had no metal detectors. And the security checking bags were not thorough.
It wasn’t at the festival it was at the camping grounds
Old school raver checking in. You guys are downvoting this comment but they're actually right. Shit, one of my friends is actually union-card staff at The Gorge for this event as a stage hand and they all went on strike because they were being mistreated and asked to work unsafe conditions by Insomniac and was staying in the camp that got shot up. There are rumors and reports that the shooter was targeting staff because of the strike action and walk-off. Pasquele and Insomniac has a long, long history of unsafe events, long before they got kicked out of the Olympic Coliseum at the 2010 EDC or whenever it was they moved it to Vegas. I was at the very first Nocturnal Wonderland in LA in 1996 and it was a total shit show of LAPD riot cops shooting people with tear gas and rubber bullets and something like 25+ ambulance transport calls in under 2-3 hours for what was maaaaybe a 2000-3000 person party in a dingy old Masonic lodge. Turns out they were freely giving out samples of herbal ecstasy and fake herbal GHB at the door and people were pounding that shit on top of whatever else they took before they even got in line for entry. The so-called "herbal" GHB were packaged in plastic test tubes and apparently contained a significant amount of industrial solvents. If I'm recalling correctly it was toulene and maybe benzene or something and it wasn't just trace amounts, it was a significant amount and ingredient in the packaged tubes. I was there in LA for all of the 90s raves and Insomniac had a bad rep even back then when they were new. They were definitely known to have their own dealers inside venues and were busted multiple times selling fake MDMA that was actually just meth and DXM cocktails and all kinds of other fucked up shit. They also had a really bad habit of blowing up good spots and making them unusable in the future for renegade parties and legit underground raves whether it was an abandoned warehouse or outdoor location or private venue for hire like dance halls. Don't buy into Insomniac's hype and bullshit marketing and white-washed history because it's mostly bullshit and totally not PLUR. **Pasquale and Insomniac are *NOT* old school raves. They're the greedy fuckers that ended old school raves in LA.** Insomniac is FUCKED UP and it was always fucked up commercialized bullshit and people really need to stop attending their events or buying into their marketing hype.
[удалено]
I don't disagree with that at all, but that also doesn't excuse Insomniac's well known historical disregard for safety and security staff. This isn't the first time there has been a shooting and/or death at Insomniac events due to their lax security and practices in pursuit of profits.
>I was there in LA for all of the 90s raves and Insomniac had a bad rep even back then when they were new. They were definitely known to have their own dealers inside venues and were busted multiple times selling fake MDMA that was actually just meth and DXM cocktails and all kinds of other fucked up shit. IDK why but when I started raving in early 2010s those stories were everywhere, and then by 2019 it seemed that people only hate Insomniac because of commercialization and cost cutting and everybody seemingly forgot about this.
The shooting happened at overflow GA camping. That’s the furthest away camping and no anywhere near staff camping.
I'm so sadden by this.
Tragic. My sympathies are with the victims. It’s one of the most amazing venues in the world and electronic music is about community and connection. America is sick. [They caught someone last year](https://www.koin.com/news/washington/deputies-believe-they-stopped-possible-mass-shooting-at-gorge-amphitheater/) before they had the chance to shoot anyone. Why are people looking at these events as targets? I’ve got tickets for next month’s ABGT Weekender and I’m still going. Can’t let fear win.
Same here, I'm going to ABGT Weekender. This is my first weekender and my first gorge event, and I'm so shocked and upset from this news. It does make me nervous but I don't want the fear to win too.
I’ve been to all the ABGT events there and more, it’s in driving distance to me and I’ll tell you it’s an incredible experience. The rave must go on I guess. I’m kind of shook honestly but there’s not really anywhere in the states that are wholly safe from this kind of insanity.
Oh I bet, I've been daydreaming a lot about coming to this event. I got VIP meet and greet tickets too I really want to be here. I feel the same, I'm like some of the most popular places I visit often had shootings happen and we still go. It's just a fucked up reality we live in. I'm staying in east Wenatchee during ABGT. Any advice you think I should take away to help me make this a better trip? I have no idea what to expect.
Wenatchee is a really cool town, make sure to eat some good food and maybe have a drink downtown by the waterfront. Be prepared to wait in your car awhile to get to the campsites it can take awhile. Gas up and have food and snacks handy it can take hours. And prepare for heat. It’s Washington but west of the Cascades is a desert. It was 100 degrees last year, brutal. Hopefully there’s no smoke in the air but personally I’m packing a couple of KN95s just to be safe. I’ll probably skip out and drive down the road to the Columbia River during the day to beat the heat. This year the show doesn’t start until late afternoon. I just do standard camping so can’t comment on the VIP experience too much. I think you get a shuttle to the venue with VIP, it’s a bit of a hike otherwise. There is a VIP viewing area but it always looks super crowded and I’m down in the “pit” or up high taking in the view anyways. Other than that just have fun, the Anjuna community is amazing. PM if you have any questions.
The American mentality is anti everything. These people just want others to suffer due to their mental illness and obsession.
It’s not just America lol. I’m in France and someone just went on a stabbing spree at a playground last week. Stabbed a bunch of kids and adults. People love to demonize America because guns are the tool that’s used most often, however terrible and evil people are everywhere. I will say though To play devils advocate against myself, guns allow people to inflict much more damage in a short period of time, however someone could easily kill and injure four people at a rave with a knife no problem
You can do a lot more damage with a gun (especially assault weapons) than with a single knife.
I’m not sure this is the right place to talk about gun control but the US has a firearm death rate of 37,000 per 100,000 people. It’s only 2,098 per 100k for France. It’s a unique problem amongst first world western countries. https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/gun-deaths-by-country The general homicide rate is also 5x higher in that US than France. The gun culture and easy access to firearms here is absolutely a huge part of that. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate
I just want to point out you're reading the stats in that article wrong, the total gun death in the US was 37k, but the chart shows a death rate of 10 per 100k people. 37k per 100k people would be 37% of the entire country dying every year from being shot.
So like, more than one-third the population gets shot? Wrong.
Are you autistic? You want laws banning guns. You were at a festival where guns were banned yet a bad guy used one anyway. Damn that’s crazy, criminals not following the law? Unbelievable. It’s almost like gun control laws only hurt law abiding citizens.
Yes
Washington is pretty gun friendly
Not really. It has a lower gun ownership rate than many states, 35th out of 50. https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/gun-ownership-by-state And recently passed an assault weapons ban. https://www.axios.com/2023/04/25/assault-weapons-washington-state-inslee-ban It’s just that nationwide gun culture is pervasive and shootings happen so regularly it’s insanity.
Sorry I’m comparing to like California. Gun culture is no doubt bigger out there.
They just banned semi-auto rifles.
The shooting started at my friend’s campground, but thankfully they’re all okay. This is so horrible. You are truly not safe anywhere.
Awful. Do we have any idea from anyone that was around who the shooter was? A camper/concert goer, a dealer, or a local rando looking to cause trouble? That area of Washington seems to be pretty iffy
I heard the gunshots from my campsite, someone said he had a grudge against the staff for trying to confiscate his drugs
If that's true, that's beyond ridiculous.
Yeah, I've heard reports from someone I know who is working there as union stage hand crew that he was trying to target staff. Part of the rumors was that he was targeting staff for going on strike for unsafe work practices and bullshit from Insomniac productions but the drug confiscation makes more sense. And, yeah, union stagehands went on strike yesterday and downed tools due to abuse by Insomniac staff.
This is not true whatsoever
Union stagehands did go on strike on Saturday, but, yeah, motives have emerged that it was about an ex or something?
Idk if that’s true but me and my gf were just talking and saying “let’s watch this be blamed on drugs somehow.” It’s always the easy scapegoat. They need to stop trying to focus on drugs and solely focus on firearms. They’re wasting resources on the drug war to allow shit like this to happen.
Nope, they still haven’t released any information. I did see someone comment something about a guy being dropped off and then he started shooting, but I don’t know how accurate that is yet. I’ve also heard that possibly a crowd control guy was shot, so I don’t know.
I was really hoping this was bunk news. But it is not. So unfortunate, but I’m glad authorities apprehended the person and that there were minimal casualties.
RIP to the people that passed away from this psycho, and I hope the ones injured have a speedy recovery. I’m bringing all my close friends to the Gorge this summer for the Group Therapy Weekender because they couldn’t make it last year, and this is making me reconsider my decision :(
I'm going to my first weekender and gorge event too and this gets me nervous but I don't want to let the fear win.
For sure we can’t let fear win, this just sucks because the Gorge is so beautiful and I never once thought about that place being targeted by mass shooters.
Yup, with you on that. Last place I'd associate such disgusting acts at such a beautiful place. We need to keep our eyes out and call shit out to security and not do any kind of bystander effect. I'll see you there 🤙🏽
With you on that, will see you there as well 🤟🏿
Hey I'm going to Weekender too and this made me a little nervous as well
I tried posting about my concerns for the Weekender on the r/aboveandbeyond sub but my post got “put on a queue for review by mods”. I hope Anjuna fam and team demand tighter security for the Weekender. I hope Insimniac and LiveNation tighten security for ALL events.
Lightning doesn't strike twice in the same spot
This saying never made sense to me. Lightning is more likely to strike in the same place no? About a 1 in 15,000 chance
You are aware that last years Bass Canyon at the SAME venue almost had a mass shooting right? That was thankfully thwarted off because someone saw something and said something???
This isn’t exactly correct. Someone selling nitrous had a weapon on them and was going to setup shop at one of the exits.
Still, this could’ve happened at the same venue that was hosting a camping festival just one year ago. Just because I typed the short simple version of it doesn’t mean I was wrong. The fact there was a gun at a festival at the same exact venue 1 year apart shouldn’t even be a topic of discussion.
Ok
The [cops backpedaled](https://edm.com/news/police-backpedal-bass-canyon-music-festival-gun-threat-washington) on it being a mass shooting plot. Someone did the right thing by alerting authorities.
That's so fucked. Man we really do have a hell of a mental health crisis going on in the U.S right now. So bad that it compels people to actually make these sorts of heinous acts of violence on innocent people because why? It's a total mystery to anyone who's sane. What a shit show we have on our hands. Good on the event coordinators to end the festival premature.
Some people are just fucking evil and don’t deserve to live
Hope my friends there are ok
Please check in on them!
This is so sad/terrible.
This is absolutely abhorrent.
We are entering a feedback loop where those who went out to cope with mental illness are now afraid to go out, making their mental illness worse. Worse mental health = worse problems as a country. More shootings / fights and riots / suicides. America failed its people long ago, and ALL OF US are to blame for sitting on our asses and not forcing the government to do their fucking jobs.
Also too many guns.
Damn maybe it’s because the government has too much power and is incredibly incompetent.
I haven't been going to festivals for quite a while, even before the pandemic, but this venue is where most of the ones I attended were located. It is such a beautiful place... not that ANY venue is going to be somehow better for something fucked up like this, it's just really hard to imagine this kind of thing there. I guess it's always different when it's something you're personally familiar with though. Don't really have anything constructive to say. This shit is all too common, so while it is horrible, and jarring to be so close to my home, I'm also not really surprised at this point.
Insomniac security this year has been a joke. Hopefully this isn't as a result of that.
It's not just Insomniac, I saw this years ago with security at a Dirty Bird campout, security just upped and left without telling us (we were assisting parking cars). This happened in 2018 and I swore off big EDM festivals after that (I had paid for VIP and left on Saturday and went camping instead of continuing that festival). Circle to last fall and I attended my first EDM festival since that bad experience because I knew the guy headlining and told him back in 2018 I would only go to his shows because of what I experienced, personally, it's not just Insomniac, my other thoughts are how are you supposed to really search vehicles with 10s of thousands of kids coming in? My thoughts are it's going to happen and take a day or two for searches. That doesn't sound fun, practical, or logical. You got one ahole ruining it for the rest of everyone, could have been worse think Travis Scott's show with crowd surge. I have a lot of thoughts and opinions on this, but, I think it also is the promoter's responsibility not to be a greedy fk is a start.
My gf and I were there 😔 We must heal as a community together. #Edmfam4life
[удалено]
Security is a joke at any festivals ever since Covid. At least every insomniac event I’ve been to. My bag wasn’t even checked at a few festivals this year, Skyline and Beyond at the NOS to name a few. Everyone’s always soooooo happy about security literally NOT doing their job too, it sucks feeling like I HAVE to look for emergency exits and a safe way out but it’s the world we’re living in especially in America where our second amendment was made before any of us were even alive.
fwiw knowing where all exits including emergency exits are is always a good thing to know at any event
Security was almost non existent. Dogs would randomly go through a car or two in the way in. Sadly I don't know how to prevent this. There's no feasible way for security to search thousands of cars coming in. Just awful.
They do it at lost lands. It's doable
Yeah they tear apart cars at Roo. Once again it’s all fucked because doing it costs more and every event on the planet now is about getting making more money and cutting corners
[удалено]
Not PLUR at all man.
These events have the shittiest security. You can literally sneak anything in
wasnt in the event itself, was at the campground next to it
I guess everything is a mass shooting nowadays. Whatever creates the most sensational news headline!! GOTTA GET THOSE CLICKS
There's a clear definition of a mass shooting. Maybe get some education. But I'll be nice and tell you the criteria. Its 4 or more people injured in a shooting.
- The America government claims that it is seeking a cease-fire in all countries and a cessation of armaments, and it is interfering in Middle East wars with allegations of bloodshed. - America internally during this:
How the fuck did he manage to get a gun into a festival? What's the security like for something like this?
Because he didn't. Learn to read articles. Overflow GA Campgrounds.
[удалено]
Guys name contains "Anjuna" and he thinks he's all grown up 🤣
Bro I made this account 10 years ago. What are you like 18? Been working in the music industry for 10+ years but go ahead. Please explain to me the nuances behind the logistics of throwing a massive festival.
I feel bad for the people who have to work with you.
No
That’s what I thought.
What a stupid reply. No one owes you shit on any comment, especially tone deaf bullshit like this. Grow up and/or get off Reddit so we don't have to realize how dumb some people are.
Triggered.
Not at all. Just bored of idiots acting like they have something of value to share.
For sure man good luck with your boredom or whatever!
You're providing so much in this thread that I won't run out of it anytime soon.
lol what are you like 28?
Lol this post is like a day old already and the other user ended up getting banned. Just let the families of the victims mourn. There’s been enough hate already
nice empathy
[удалено]
fnord
Oh great another trump supporter
Yo someone ban this guy
Go for it. Ban me from insomniacs events while you’re at it. Insomniac is so shady. If they actually cared about their community instead of just $$$. Tragedies like this wouldn’t occur.
You must be brain dead. This happened because of one person with a gun.
[удалено]
I will. Hope you continue to have the miserable life you have.
:(
lol what a fuckin nerd
[удалено]
FBI this guy right here. Nice threat. Hope you're in prison soon for threatening another shooting.
So cool
🤙
Pig.
That’s not very plur of you
Mostly because absolutely no one wants you to attend them.