Music fans die in festival stampede
AT LEAST eight young people have been killed and up to 300 injured in a horrifying stampede at a music festival, which crushed fans against a stage.
A mass surge among the 50,000 sell-out crowd happened “suddenly” as rapper Travis Scott went on stage at NRG Park stadium in Houston, Texas, on Friday night.
In the ensuing chaos, witnesses described harrowing scenes as it became clear that panic-stricken fans were struggling to escape the crush, with many gasping for breath.
Watching from the crowd was Scott’s pregnant girlfriend – the model Kylie Jenner, 24 – who was reportedly “shaken to her core but unhurt”.
Houston Police Assistant Chief Larry Satterwhite said: “It happened all at once. Suddenly, we had several people down on the ground, experiencing some type of cardiac arrest or some kind of medical episode.”
Seventeen people were rushed to hospital, 11 in cardiac arrest. It later emerged that the eight who died were aged between 14 and 27. Their names
have not been released. Houston Fire Chief Samuel Pena said: “The crowd began to compress towards the front of the stage. That caused some panic and started causing some injuries.
“People began to fall out, become unconscious – and that created additional panic.”
Scott, 30, abandoned his set, which was being live-streamed by Apple Music, after stopping multiple times when he spotted fans in distress at the front of the heaving audience. At one stage he could be seen pointing into the crowd and calling for aid, saying: “Security, somebody, help real quick.”
In a statement issued via social media yesterday, Scott said: “I’m absolutely devastated by what took place last night.” He added that police had his “total support” and he was “committed to working together with the Houston community to heal and support the families in need”.
Earlier there were reports that some fans without tickets stormed through AVIP entrance gate with security powerless to stop them.
But Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner said it was “too early” to speculate on causes or determine whether security precautions were adequate.
And amid growing claims that “spiked drugs” may have caused cardiac arrests, he declared: “I don’t even want to go to drug overdoses.
“We are looking at all potential causes of this incident and what caused the cardiac arrests.”
He promised a “thorough review” into the disaster, adding: “We’re not taking anything off the table.”