Ten Dead, Hundreds Injured after Travis Scott’s Astroworld Festival Turns into Mass Casualty Event
Houston music festival Astroworld has turned into a mass-casualty event with ten people dead and hundreds of others injured. The music festival, set to take place over the course of the weekend at NRG Park, was cancelled after a crowd surge occurred on Friday November 5th, injuring many festival attendees.
Attendees state that the stampede began as crowds gathered to wait for Travis Scott to perform. A countdown timer began counting down to 9 p.m., when Travis Scott was set to go on stage. As the timer got closer to zero, attendees stated that the crowding got worse and worse.
Festival attendees stated that it became difficult to breathe, and that people were passing out all around them. Concertgoers described the surging crowds as a “toppling jenga-tower of people,” with many being trampled by the “wave” of frenzied fans.
The festival boasted over 50,000 attendees, many of whom entered without tickets.
Accounts from Concertgoers
Many of the concertgoers published videos, photos, and notes onto social media documenting their harrowing experiences. One festivalgoer, a woman named Seanna McCarty, documented her experience at Astroworld on Instagram. In a post about the event, she stated that she felt like she was drowning in “sinkholes” of people, and that she and a friend were trapped in the crowd amongst unconscious concertgoers, struggling to get up and exit the venue. They screamed at nearby security guards for help, but were unable to get their attention.
Eventually, McCarty made it out. She was then seen on video climbing onto a platform that was 15 feet off the ground, close to the stage. She attempted to alert a cameraman of the situation, but he ignored her. She then pushed his camera towards the pit of people, at which point another man joined her on the platform, saying that he would push her off of the platform if she didn’t get down.
Another attendee, an ICU nurse named Madeline Eskins, stated that she lost consciousness and was carried out of the surging crowds by her boyfriend. When she came to, she told security guards that she was an ICU nurse and offered to help tend to injured attendees after seeing that some of the medical workers on staff did not know how to check for a pulse or properly perform CPR.
Many of the attendees were attempting to help medical professionals administer CPR. Still other concertgoers lifted their unconscious friends into the crowd, hoping that the strangers around them would crowd-surf them to safety. Officials state that there weren’t enough medical personnel contracted for the event. In addition to the contracted paramedics, more than 60 city ambulances were dispatched to the event, though some concert attendees made it difficult for them to reach those in need. One viral video posted onto twitter shows concertgoers dancing on top of an ambulance stuck in a crowd.
A History of Negligence
Travis Scott, a Houston native, has issued a statement stating that he is working with local authorities to get to the bottom of what happened at Astroworld. He has offered to pay for funeral expenses of those who died, is working to refund festival attendees, and has partnered with mental health app BetterHelp to offer free therapy to those who attended Astroworld.
However, some argue that Scott’s past misdeeds prove he has a history of negligence. In 2015, the rapper was arrested for disorderly conduct after he encouraged his fans to jump over the barriers during his performance at Lollapalooza, another music festival in Chicago. He was arrested again for disorderly conduct as well as inciting a riot and endangering the welfare of a minor in 2017 for inviting his fans to rush the stage at another performance in Arkansas.
In another 2017 show, Scott encouraged fans to jump from the balcony, saying that the people below would catch them. One fan, then 23-year-old Kyle Green, did not jump but was pushed off the balcony that night by the surging crowd. The fall left Green, now 27, partially paralyzed. In 2018, Scott released a song called Stargazing with “it ain’t a mosh pit if ain’t no injuries/ I got ‘em stage divin’ out the nosebleeds,” as lyrics.
The rapper has also been accused of encouraging a culture of violence on social media that contributed to the events. In a now-deleted tweet, Scott had urged fans to “sneak in” to the festival in May after it sold out. Sure enough, earlier in the day before the deadly surge occurred, a number of people were seen rushing into the Astroworld venue through a VIP entrance, many of which did not have tickets to the event.
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If you or a loved one was injured at Astroworld, contact our Personal Injury Lawyers today. We have a history of representing injured people and their loved ones, and we can help you too. Call us at 713-224-9000, or fill out our contact form here.
Michael S Callahan is an attorney and founder of The Callahan Law Firm. He focuses his practice on representing individuals and families in personal injury cases involving motor vehicle and truck accidents, workplace accidents and defective products. With over 25 years of experience, he is dedicated to fighting on behalf of people whose lives have been forever altered by the negligence and carelessness of corporations and individuals. Originally trained as a mechanical engineer, Michael has been practicing law and fighting for justice for those who need it most since 1994. He is board-certified in Personal Injury Trial Law by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization and a member of various esteemed legal associations. Outside of work, Michael enjoys spending quality time with his family, outdoor activities, and continually striving to improve as a trial lawyer and human being.
