Story at a glance
- A crowd surge killed eight people and injured dozens of others on Friday.
- Past incidents involved similar lethal crowd crushes.
- Several fires at music venues have also claimed hundreds of lives.
Deadly chaos unfolded at the Astroworld music festival in Houston on Friday as a crowd surge killed eight people and injured dozens of others.
The crowd of about 50,000 people began moving in so tightly as headliner Travis Scott took the stage that concertgoers were crushed and trampled in what authorities declared a “mass casualty incident.”
At least 25 were hospitalized and more than 300 were injured and treated at the scene.
While details of the incident are still being released, the show is drawing comparisons to some of the deadliest concerts in American history.
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The Altamont Speedway Free Festival 1969
The Rolling Stones sought to cap off their 1969 U.S. tour with a free concert at the old Altamont Speedway in northern California they hoped would be the Woodstock of the west, which included acts such as Santana, Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane. The largely improvised show also included several dozen members of the Hells Angels motorcycle club to provide security. The event is famously known for considerable violence carried out by the Hells Angels, including the stabbing death of 18-year-old Meredith Hunter during the performance by The Rolling Stones. The incident was caught on camera. Two others were killed in a hit-and-run car accident and another died in an accidental drowning.
The Who in Cincinnati
A stampede of fans eager to see The Who at Cincinnati’s Riverfront Coliseum left 11 people dead and several injured on the night of Dec. 3 1979. The crowd rushed through the arena’s entry doors before the start of the show to jockey for first-come, first-serve festival seating, resulting in a deadly surge of fans. The British rock band played the show without knowing about the tragedy and were informed after the concert.
The Station nightclub fire
One hundred people were killed and more than 200 were injured on Feb. 20, 2003 when The Station nightclub in West Warick, Rhode Island erupted in flames and burned to the ground. Pyrotechnics cued up for the rock band Great White set fire to flammable foam installed as soundproofing, spreading flames along the foam-lined walls and ceiling. Many people became trapped and died or were severely burned.
The Rhythm Club fire
More than 200 people were killed in the Rhythm Club dance hall in Natchez, Miss., on April, 23 1940, where jazz musician Walter Barnes and his Royal Creolians performed to a crowd of more than 700 people. A fire broke out near the entrance of the venue and quickly accelerated due to Spanish moss that hung from the ceiling that had been spread with a petroleum-based insecticide. The building had only two doors and one was locked, trapping concertgoers in the flames. All of the victims were African Americans.
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