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'It could have been me': How the tragedy at Astroworld Festival unfolded
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Local // Houston


'IT COULD HAVE BEEN ME': HOW THE TRAGEDY AT ASTROWORLD FESTIVAL UNFOLDED

Joey Guerra, St. John Barned-Smith, Alejandro Serrano, Paul Takahashi
Nov. 7, 2021Updated: Nov. 8, 2021 11:15 a.m.

Comments
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1of10

Alyssa Cortes, center, hugs a friend as they view the Astroworld Festival
memorial items along Westridge St. at Kirby Dr. in NRG Park Sunday, Nov. 7, 2021
in Houston. She said she and her friends attended the festival and had a
difficult time getting out. Eight were killed and multiple people were injured
as Travis Scott was performing at Saturday’s Astroworld Festival.

Melissa Phillip/Staff photographerShow MoreShow Less 2of10

Alexis Navarro grieves at a memorial for those who died at the Astroworld music
festival the night before, on Saturday, Nov. 6, 2021, at NRG Park in Houston.

Jon Shapley/Staff photographerShow MoreShow Less 3of10

A memorial of flowers, candles, and other items is shown along Westridge St. at
Kirby Dr. in NRG Park Sunday, Nov. 7, 2021 in Houston. Eight were killed and
multiple people were injured as Travis Scott was performing at Saturday’s
Astroworld Festival.

Melissa Phillip/Staff photographerShow MoreShow Less 4of10

A candle with a handwritten message honoring victim Rudy Pena of Laredo is shown
among the Astroworld Festival memorial items displayed along Westridge St. at
Kirby Dr. in NRG Park Sunday, Nov. 7, 2021 in Houston. Eight were killed and
multiple people were injured as Travis Scott was performing at Saturday’s
Astroworld Festival.

Melissa Phillip/Staff photographerShow MoreShow Less 5of10

Two people who knew a victim of the Astroworld concert embrace at a memorial.

Robert Bumsted, STF / Associated PressShow MoreShow Less 6of10A person signs a
card at a memorial for those who died at the Astroworld music festival the night
before, on Saturday, Nov. 6, 2021, at NRG Park in Houston.Jon Shapley/Staff
photographerShow MoreShow Less 7of10Jessica Bazan cries at a memorial for those
who died at the Astroworld music festival the night before, on Saturday, Nov. 6,
2021, at NRG Park in Houston.Jon Shapley/Staff photographerShow MoreShow Less
8of10

Greg Riojas grieves at a memorial for those who died at the Astroworld music
festival the night before, on Saturday, Nov. 6, 2021, at NRG Park in Houston.
“Damn, they’re gone,” he said. “They went to a party and never came home.”

Jon Shapley/Staff photographerShow MoreShow Less 9of10A man grieves from his
parked car at a memorial for those who died at the Astroworld music festival the
night before, on Saturday, Nov. 6, 2021, at NRG Park in Houston.Jon
Shapley/Staff photographerShow MoreShow Less 10of10

Travis Scott performs at Astroworld Festival at NRG park on Friday, November 5,
2021.

Jamaal Ellis, Houston Chronicle / ContributorShow MoreShow Less
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Stunning accounts of people gasping for air and being trampled in a raucous
crowd of 50,000 surfaced Saturday as Houston’s first major music festival since
the pandemic turned into one of the deadliest concerts in U.S. history.

Eight people — including a 14-year-old and a 16-year-old — died and two dozen
others were hospitalized after the mayhem Friday night during rapper Travis
Scott’s performance at the Astroworld Festival at NRG Park. Identities and
causes of death will be released by authorities after the autopsies are
completed.

John Hilgert, an athlete and Memorial High School freshman, was the youngest
Astroworld casualty, Spring Branch Independent School District officials said in
an email Saturday to parents and students. Dallas resident Danish Baig, 27, was
trampled in the general admission crowd, according to his younger brother, Basil
Mirza Baig.



“It could have been me,” said 18-year-old Frisco resident Landon White, as he
placed two pink and red roses on a makeshift vigil Saturday night.

White paid $380 for his Astroworld Fest ticket, where, at one point, he was
crushed to the point of having a hard time breathing.

“I had to come here to show some respect,” he said.

The sold out Astroworld Festival crowd of mostly young people was excited as
they ventured out Friday afternoon, anticipating a night with some semblance of
normalcy after months of pandemic lockdowns and restrictions. The city's last
major music festival, the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo, was unexpectedly cut
short in March 2020 as the coronavirus pandemic broke out.

“Nobody should ever expect for a loved one to go to a concert and not return,”
Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo said Saturday. “People go to these events
looking for a good time. It’s not the kind of event where you expect to find out
about fatalities.”


The tragedy at Astroworld Festival

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

- 'We were like sardines in a can': Astroworld survivors recount chaos amid
filing of more lawsuits

- Preventing the next Astroworld tragedy: What can the music industry do?

-Leaked Houston firefighter logs offer minute-by-minute look into Astroworld
tragedy

- Before Astroworld, Travis Scott revamped a Sunnyside basketball court. Now,
nearly every trace of him is gone.

- Travis Scott 'had no idea what was going on' during Astroworld tragedy,
rapper's spokesperson says

- 'It was like watching a Jenga tower topple' at Astroworld Festival

- For 37 minutes, Travis Scott kept playing as ‘mass casualty’ unfolded

- 'It could have been me': How the tragedy at Astroworld Festival unfolded

SEE MORE RELATED STORIES HERE


'THE CROWD WAS MOVING SO HARD'

Troubles started early, after some people without tickets rushed through
barricades, trampling each other in hoping to gain entry to the festival.
Throughout the day, more than 300 people were treated at a field hospital at NRG
Park with heat exhaustion, alcohol poisoning and drug overdoses. Officials said
multiple doses of Narcan, a medication used to reverse an opioid overdose, were
administered at the concert, which ended abruptly in the interest of public
safety.

Much is still unknown, but police and fire officials said a massive crowd began
pushing toward the stage around 9 p.m. during the rapper’s closing performance.
Attendees said it became difficult to breathe in the crush of the crowd. Some
people fell, others panicked.

FILLING IN THE GAPS: Are you in these photos? We want to hear your Astroworld
stories.

Several concert-goers posted photos and videos of people performing CPR on
fellow attendees who were sprawled on the floor. In one video, a man and woman
appeared to climb onto a platform to alert a camera operator about what was
happening in the crowds below — to no avail.

Billy Nasser, a 24-year-old DJ who attended the concert Friday night, said the
first four or five songs went without a hitch. Then the crowd started surging,
and people started falling.

“Everyone in the front was getting crushed,” Nasser recounted early Saturday.
“The crowd was moving so hard, people were falling over and then tripping over
the people on the ground.”

TRAGEDY AT ASTROWORLD: Social media posts show fans begging to stop the
Astroworld show

It’s still unclear what exactly caused the eight deaths, but health and crowd
control experts said people in large crowds can face life-threatening health
complications, particularly from traumatic injuries from being trampled in a
stampede or crushed by a crowd. Head and chest injuries are the most common in a
crowd incident. Pressure generated by massive crowds can break ribs, which can
puncture the lung and cause hemorrhaging, or deprive vital organs of oxygen.

“When oxygen can’t get where it’s supposed to go, people can die quickly,” said
Dr. George Williams, an ICU pulmonologist at the University of Texas Health
Science Center at Houston and LBJ Hospital.

Kevin Rosario of Atlantic City talks about what he witnessed attending the
Astroworld festival on Friday where 8 people were killed during the Astroworld
festival during surges in the crowd during Travis Scott's performance that
crushed concert goers according to Houston Fire Chief Sam Peña, on Nov. 6, 2021.

Mark Mulligan, Houston Chronicle / Staff photographer


INVESTIGATION LAUNCHED FOR FESTIVAL CHAOS

Houston firefighters said 11 of the two dozen people who were hospitalized went
into cardiac arrest, which happens when the heart suddenly stops.

Hidalgo and Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner on Saturday called for an
investigation into the concert.

“This is now a criminal investigation,” Houston police Chief Troy Finner said,
adding that homicide and narcotics detectives will be tasked with taking a
closer look at what happened. The Harris County’s District Attorney’s Office
will assist, officials said.

Gov. Greg Abbott directed the Texas Department of Public Safety to make state
resources available to support the investigation, he said in a statement.

“We're not going to leave any stone unturned,” Turner said Saturday during a TV
interview with CNN. “We want to look at every single detail to determine what
led up to it and what additional steps that need to take place to keep it from
happening again, especially in this city.”

Astroworld Festival organizers said they are supportive of the investigation,
and encouraged concert attendees to reach out to police if they have any
relevant information about the the crowd surge. The two-day festival, held since
2018, was created by Scott and named after the former Six Flags Astroworld
amusement park.

"Our hearts are with the Astroworld Festival family tonight — especially those
we lost and their loved ones,” Scott tweeted. “We are focused on supporting
local officials however we can. As authorities mentioned in their press
conference earlier, they are looking into the series of cardiac arrests that
took place. If you have any relevant information on this, please reach out to
Houston Police. Thank you to our partners at the Houston Police Department, Fire
Department and NRG Park for their response and support.”

Day 2 of the festival, scheduled for Saturday, was to feature Latin superstar
Bad Bunny, Earth, Wind & Fire and Beaumont native Teezo Touchdown.

Now Playing:
Eight people were killed and dozens more injured after a sold-out crowd of
roughly 50,000 surged at Astroworld Festival 2021. Video: Laura Duclos, ABC13
Houston, Eric Daniels



A HISTORY OF VIOLATIONS

Live Nation, the concert producer behind Astroworld Festival, has a history of
safety violations. The California company, one of the largest live entertainment
operations in the world, has been sued over injuries at crowded concerts in New
York, Illinois, North Carolina and Vancouver.

Between 2016 and 2019, Live Nation Entertainment and its subsidiary Live Nation
Worldwide were cited for 10 OSHA violations, including problems with a ladder,
rope and scaffolding that caused a fall at a theater in Connecticut in 2016. The
company has also faced lawsuits, including one by a concertgoer who broke her
leg during a stampede at an outdoor Gwen Stefani concert in North Carolina in
July 2016.

Astroworld Festival faced similar crowd control issues in 2019, Hidalgo said.
With each passing year, more police and private security officers have been
added to the event.

Concert-goer Steven Gutierrez, 26, said he watched in horror as people flooded
toward the stage at Astroworld Festival on Friday. Fans pressed up against each
other, moving almost as one unit in the mosh pit, he said. In some places,
people were so crammed together that they started hyperventilating or struggling
to leave.

TRAVIS SCOTT SPEAKS: He could 'never imagine anything like this happening'

“It got to the point people were stepping on other people,” said Gutierrez, a
New York resident who traveled with his friends to Houston. “If you let go, you
could easily drift apart.”

His friend, Kevin Rosario, said: “It's scary to think we had a great time and
for other people it was the last time they were alive.”

Concertgoer Christian Souza tried to help up people who had fallen. He said he
and others lifted one unconscious man over a barricade, then watched paramedics
spend 20 minutes trying to revive him.

"He was definitely unconscious. I quickly looked for a pulse... I didn't feel
anything," he said. "I saw some girl just laying there. And I never really seen
some dead people instantly like that, like fresh dead. But it looked like she
was not alive."

Seidy Garcia, 22, from Fulton, Calif., brought a bouquet of red roses to a
makeshift memorial outside the Astroworld Festival grounds late Saturday.
Garcia, who attended the concert Friday night, was tired and bruised, but said
she wanted to pay her respects.

“I never imagined people would die,” she said.

Reporters Gabrielle Banks, Brittany Britto, Andrew Dansby, Marcy de Luna, Julian
Gill, J.R. Gonzales, Nicole Hensley, Samantha Ketterer, Monique Welch and
Charlie Zong contributed.

paul.takahashi@chron.com

twitter.com/paultakahashi







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Written By
Joey Guerra, St. John Barned-Smith, Alejandro Serrano
Written By
Paul Takahashi
Reach Paul on

Paul Takahashi is a business reporter for the Houston Chronicle.

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