Eight concertgoers died last night during Travis Scott’s Astroworld Festival in Houston. According to reports, the crowd pushed wildly towards the stage during Scott’s set, which also caused injuries to more than 300.
Taking place at NRG Park, home of the NFL’s Houston Texans, the Astroworld Festival had an estimated 50,000 people in attendance to see artists including Roddy Ricch, SZA, and Lil Baby, with Scott serving as headliner for the first of two nights.
“The crowd began to compress towards the front of the stage, and that caused some panic, and it started causing some injuries,” Houston Fire Chief Samuel Peña said in a press conference. “People began to fall out, become unconscious, and it created additional panic.”
The festival released a statement on November 6, which was criticized by some social media users for “negligence and lack of accountability” and being a “disgusting response from a disgusting festival management team.”
“Our hearts are with the Astroworld Festival family tonight–especially those we lost and their loved ones,” they wrote. “As authorities mentioned in their press conference earlier, they are looking into the series of cardiac arrests that took place.”
Scott posted a response to the tragedy around noon EST on the 6th. “I’m absolutely devastated by what took place last night. My prayers go out to the families and all those impacted by what happened at Astroworld Festival,” he wrote. “I am committed to working together with the Houston community to heal and support the families in need.”
The Astroworld Festival began in 2018, but did not take place in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
People in attendance told The New York Times that the festival was “really hectic from the beginning” and that “It was like hell.” Videos posted on social media depicted fans dancing atop ambulances trying to move through the crowd with wounded concertgoers.
As some pointed out, there is a history of dangerous fan behavior at Travis Scott concerts. A fan at a 2017 New York City show sued Scott when he was allegedly pushed from a balcony and left paralyzed after suffering a fractured vertebrae. Scott was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct at Lollapalooza in 2015 after encouraging fans to scale barricades and ignore security during his set.
Footage from the beginning of the day in Houston showed fans breaking through security barriers to get into the festival, though there were no fatalities at the time. Reports from the show say that it was “understaffed.”
An Instagram post from an ICU nurse who attended the festival was circulated widely on social media. “As someone who has been to every Astro fest there’s been, this was completely different. It was awful,” she wrote. She also detailed a chaotic scene where multiple bodies were on the ground and there were insufficient emergency supplies to resuscitate people.
“People were begging the crew operating the stage lights and stuff around us to stop the concert and they wouldn’t,” she wrote. “Finally cops showed up with more stretchers and started getting people out, but I know at least two individuals had been pulseless for 15 minutes minimum before they got on the stretcher.”
Another fan shared that they attempted to tell security to pause the show to help those in need of medical attention, but were told, “‘We already know, and we can’t do anything to stop the show, they’re streaming live.’” Scott apparently did try to pause his set at one point as an ambulance moved through the crowd.