November 6, 2021

"Knowing what we know now..."

What we know now: "8 dead, hundreds injured at Astroworld fest Friday night, hours after stampede" (ABC 13)("The worst of the incident began around 9:15 p.m. when the crowd of approximately 50,000 concert-goers began to move toward the front of the stage.... 'The crowd began to compress toward the front of the stage, and people began to panic'").

43 comments:

David Begley said...

This was at an event featuring the rapper Travis Scott. I’d never heard of him until today.

Fernandinande said...

"It’s lovely being part of being part of this big blob of humans."

Owen said...

Wait…are they suggesting that when a large crowd begins to move, people in the crowd are pushed or dragged along involuntarily? And if it were January 6 on the grounds of the US Capitol, there might be irresistible “hydraulic” pressure to enter the grounds or the building itself?

No way!

Marcus Carman said...

As society breaks down........

Yancey Ward said...

This is why I avoid packed crowds altogether.

bobby said...

Shades of WKRP.

Gospace said...

Astroworld- completely neutral name. What's it about?

Ah- organized by a rapper.

Riotous behavior, breakdown of law and order, people dead.

And what sprang into my mind just seeing that? John Derbyshire's "The Talk.

Didn't have to have any version of "The Talk" with my children. They were smart enough to figure it out on their own from what they saw around them.

Achilles said...

The security guard going in and trying to trip people at the gates...

Achilles said...

Horses!?!!

In front of a charging mob?!!!

gilbar said...

Police spokesman says: "it just happened So Suddenly!" ... At 9:38pm

BUT! EIGHT HOURS Earlier (at "2 pm") there was ALREADY, Complete Chaos
BUT! The Show Must Go On!!!!!

what else do we expect, with a crowd of redneck hillbilly white trash slobs???
Serves them RIGHT!!!
(what's that? it was a RAP Concert?? oh, never mind.... then it was a sad tragedy)

Achilles said...

Well, play stupid games win stupid prizes.

Young people need these kind of examples.

It is part of being young. We were all there once.

Ice Nine said...

Bummer of a name, bruh. Bad draw. Had his mother only known that her little tyke, Travis Scott, would some day be a rap "singer" she would have given him the name Trayvon, instead of one that sounds like a country-western singer.

Uncle Pavian said...

I'm sort of losing interest in being part of a large group of people in a public space.

WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...

When I was a teenager- back in the nineteen ... grrnublmenumner shmmpzz.
The big fun thrill for Halloween was the Mall Crawl on Pearl Street in Boulder.
(an event that is no longer allowed - permanently cancelled)
For many years it was really fun - (years before I was old enough to go) People would parade around in the most amazing and creative costumes. It was a fun night out for adults.

The event became so popular, it was eventually ruined by massive crowds, drunken losers, and glass-smashing idiots perpetrating property damage. The stores that line the outdoor mall were fed up with the property damage and begged for it all to stop.

Anyway - as a teen I was able to attend one or two of the "mall crawls" before it all ended. I will never forget what happened to me and my friends. We were in the crowd, not drinking - just looking around and enjoying the spectacle when all of a sudden the crowd became so DENSE with people, we could NOT MOVE. It was a heart-stopping feeling to lose control of your ability TO MOVE. We were packed like sardines and could feel the sway of a panicked crowd. I recall thinking 'just don't fall down'.. We were finally able to worm our way to the side and we all looked at each other with relief - and decided to leave and never go back. It was that freaky.
Crowds are scary.

WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...

The way these young people worship their rock-rap gods is ... about as strange as the Microsoft robots announcing their pronouns, gender, and hair color.

Run for the hills.

Birches said...

My sister was trampled at the first Lalapalooza tour. I forget who was playing. But she managed to get herself out without major damage. I still remember seeing her doc martins covered in dead grass the morning after.

She and my brother still talk about that concert fondly.

mikee said...

Had site security at Woodstock not given up, allowing free access to one and all, this sort of disaster would be the legacy of that event, too.

Tomcc said...

I saw a headline about this earlier and thought it's an odd thing to happen at a CW concert. Upon reading the article I discovered that Mr. Scott is a rapper and he has a child with one of the Jenner girls. This happened in Texas, so the cause of death will be Covid.

WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...

I wonder how a few **sneeze sneeze cough cough** "I HAVE COVID - WATCH OUT!" thrown in would work?

glam1931 said...

I had an equally bad experience many years ago at Guavaween in Tampa's Ybor City. It took me and my companion 2 hours to wade through the press of people back to a parking area to escape. Never went to such an event again. At it's peak in the 1990s before it became more heavily regulated, Guavaween drew 120,000 people, so you can imagine the mob atmosphere.

retail lawyer said...

Gospace, thanks for that link. I had forgotten where I saw that, and only remembered

(10a) Avoid concentrations of blacks not all known to you personally.

because guns tend to go off, knifes are flashed . . . even at municipal celebrations of diversity, equity, and inclusion. Where Oakland city officials are reduced to blaming shootings on gangs from San Francisco. Where Marin County shootings (at a rap concert) are blamed on out of towners.

Temujin said...

Yeah, I tend to avoid large crowds these days and have for years now. Except for hockey games. Hockey fans (and players) are a bit different and though a fight may break out on the ice, or in the stands, it's fairly rare these days and afterward the antagonists typically go have a beer together. That's hockey. The Travis Scott crowd looks more unruly than hockey fans.

Anyway- seeing as how society as a whole is failing and that walking down the streets of most of our major cities is a safety hazard all by itself, I see no reason to put yourself in a position of danger unnecessarily. The time will come soon enough for it to be necessary.

Andrew said...

If only that security crew had acted a little faster to make vague and feigned attempts to halt the crowd. Did they think they were getting paid by the arm movements and head fakes? Geez, I could be a security guard if that's the standard.

RIP to those who were lost.

Maynard said...

I guess that is what happens when you fail to exercise social distancing.

William said...

There aren't that many accidental shootings during the making of movies, but concert mishaps are frequent and sometimes involve mass casualties.....From what I've read, there wasn't proper security at the event and the medical people on the scene were ill trained and ill prepared.....This is a much bigger fuck up than the Baldwin shooting. Do the concert performers bear any responsibility for the mishaps at their concerts? Baldwin--justifiably--has gotten a lot of shame and blame for that death. I'll be interested in seeing the fall out from this. So far as I remember, The Who never suffered any loss of reputation or income after the stampede deaths at one of their concerts.

Narr said...

Scott Travis, Travis Scott . . . all those peckerwoods sound alike to me. And those horseback cops whipping those fans reminded me of slavery days.

Not really, they reminded me of the breakdown of civil order that signals the end of a regime.

I recall a local "Pub Crawl" along our Madison Avenue on St. Patrick's Day. Like Can's event it grew from a small, laid back event to a major public nuisance over the decades, and has been tamed almost to nonexistence now I think.

I have avoided crowds of people for decades, especially crowds of young people, especially crowds of young minority people.

loudogblog said...

We haven't done any big, outdoor concerts at the theme park in over a decade, but when we did them we had a buffer zone in front of the stage set up so that the crowd couldn't actually get right up to the stage. Security would be in the buffer zone to police it. If the crowd did get unruly and climbed over small barricades, the show would be immediately stopped and there would be an announcement through the PA for the crowd to move back. A few "artists" had their egos bruised after being stopped mid song, but theme parks don't like to take chances with any bad PR that would be generated by a crowd getting out of hand.(and guests being hurt) Also, because security was down in front of the stage they could run out and rescue anyone who fainted or got hurt. Crowd control is a serious business and requires plans being made, enough security people (with radios) and lots of money being spent. Since I was a lighting guy, I would either deadhead the band's lighting guy or run the light board myself. We always had a fader we called the "oh,shit!" fader. That fader would bring all the stage and house lighting up to full in case something went wrong and the show need to be stopped.

PM said...

"The Talk"

#2: Uh, no. At first, West Africans were used as slaves by the Portuguese, but were very soon considered 'inferior workers'. That's why southern Africans - bigger, hardier - were hunted by black slavers and held in stockades up West African rivers for nearly the entirety of the three-century Trade.

Andy said...

Astroworld- completely neutral name. What's it about?
Astroworld was the name of a theme park that was once near the site of the event. Astroworld closed down some time ago strange that they used that name.

TreeJoe said...

The training of that security and police staff is terrifying. There is a mass exodus of people trying to get away from. Something at all costs. Why don’t we block their way and slow them down while knocking
Some over ?!?

ALP said...

Perfect example of why I avoid large crowds. Even a "happy" crowd gathered for an entertainment event can turn violent.

Yancey Ward said...

"Shades of WKRP"

Of course, that episode was about an actual event at the Cincinnati Coliseum at the end of 1979 in which 11 people were crushed in stampede at a Who concert.

Yancey Ward said...

I have attended a lot of big concerts over the past 37 years- I never go near the stage at all, for any reason, and I try to arrive after most of the crowd has already entered, and I never arrive early to wait at the doors.

Scott Patton said...

Similar results at a The Who concert in 1979. It happened outside before the concert. I think there was general admission for floor seating and "a rush of concert-goers outside the Coliseum's entry doors resulted in the deaths of 11 people".
By chance I saw them the day before in Pittsburgh, seated way up top in the Civic Arena. The floor was a mass of humans.
Even have a pic.

Mikey NTH said...

Sounds like the Who concert in Cincinnati back in the late 1970's - early 1980's.

gspencer said...

Paying attention to John Derbyshire's Rule 10 may save your life.

NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...

I'll be interested in seeing the fall out from this. So far as I remember, The Who never suffered any loss of reputation or income after the stampede deaths at one of their concerts.

That incident was found to be the sole fault of the promoter. The band did get some grief for continuing on with the show, but they had not been told what had occurred and I believe there was some worry that there might be a riot if the concert was cancelled.

wildswan said...

Just remember this Derbyshire fans - the blacks you meet know what your attitude is as well as if you had those rules printed on a T-shirt. Better, because they read it off you in a split-lightning second and nothing is fine print to them. Your entire interaction with them follows from the fact that they know at once that you hold these attitudes. If you held different attitudes, the entire interaction would be different. You would then realize, know in your gut, that the IQ tests are not measuring their intelligence and it is not true that 40% are almost retarded which is what an IQ of 80 means in some circumstances. Why does this quick intelligence not do well in the schools? I don't really know but I think the US DOE and the Teachers Colleges and the front-line teachers should have figured it out by now. And you know, sometimes, often now, the blacks are doing well and joining the other successful minorities. Where they aren't doing well, in the black communities in the big Dem cities, I don't think CRT is going to help because CRT teaches racial bias but also because in a strange way CRT is the same kind of thing as the Derbyshire attitude. With a Derbyshire or a CRT virtual reality helmet on your head, you simply are not seeing the person in front of you and the members of the black community are simply tired, proud, scornful, disgusted - everything but a happy learner when they have to face that again.

BUMBLE BEE said...

Video from the concert. people shouting stop the show, people are dying.
https://twitter.com/i/status/1457034216248537088

Rory said...

Gotta love the kid who ran past with a mask on.

gilbar said...

And you know, sometimes, often now, the blacks are doing well

Those are called light skinned blacks

actual items said...

I never know what to make of the “I’ve never heard of this famous person or thing” blog comment.

My teenage son listens to Travis Scott. I have given him a listen and filed him squarely in the “not for me” category, but that’s fine! There are plenty of really popular things that are not for me.

My kids all play soccer, thus we’ve taken to watching more of it on TV to better learn the sport. And my same teenage son and I were watching a game between 2 German teams I never heard of. And he remarked, wow I have no idea who these teams are but there are tens of thousands of people packed in there, singing and chanting.

This reminded me of an anecdote from Chuck Klosterman shared on a podcast years ago. He was on a book tour in Australia, I think it was Melbourne, and the whole city was shut down on a random weekday with everyone dressed to the nines for some horse race he had never heard of.

rastajenk said...

My younger brother was in the middle of the Who tragedy in Cincinnati. He lost his shoes, and was somehow squeezed through the one door that was available. Once inside, he found a spot on the floor of the concourse and just sat there through the concert, trying to regain his bearings and take stock of what had just happened. And regain the energy to find his friends and get home.

There was a good local TV special a couple years ago on the 40th 'anniversary' of that event, with Pete and Roger reflecting on how it affected them, too. I think there are still a lot of emotional scars that the survivors have had to live with.