On the first night of Travis Scott’s two-day Astroworld festival, a tragedy occurred when the crowd of Scott’s own performance rushed toward the stage, causing a deadly surge in which eight lives were lost and over 300 concertgoers were injured.
The root causes of the stampede have been notoriously unclear all weekend, but many are calling it one of the deadliest crowd disasters at a music event in years that, nonetheless, should not have happened in the first place.
Scott, as well as organizers of the music festival and other representatives or individuals involved, are now facing a lawsuit–assumedly, the first of many–filed by one of the attendees injured by the crush, Manuel Souza. The lawsuit is seeking at least $1M in damages in the accusation of Scott and others for negligence and gross negligence.
According to Souza, the disaster was due to “a motivation for profit at the expense of concertgoers’ health and safety,” as organizers were said to ignore warning signs and make “the conscious decision to let the show go on, despite the extreme risk of harm.” The suit also claims “encouragement of violence” from Scott himself, as he is reportedly known to encourage intensity from his fans, often calling out for them to “rage” as he performs.
There has, so far, been no response from Scott, his representatives, nor the other parties involved in the lawsuit.
Details of the heartbreaking tragedy continue to reveal themselves, and, while Scott has attempted to make both verbal and written acknowledgment of the event, many music fans are calling for more justice and more responsibility for the lives both harmed and lost.
—
Photo credit: hurricanehank / Shutterstock.com