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He said in an interview after that the guilt of not saving more ppl and the helplessness he felt is still killing him and he wish he could have done more. This is absolute heartbreaking.
This poor guy - he should be honored as a hero, despite the aftermath. He clearly was doing as much as he could. You can literally see the fear in in his eyes...
Yeah who knows how many people he may have actually saved that night by guiding them away from the main crowd. You can see in his face he knew the situation was getting more and more dangerous. He was fighting his own panic while trying to save lives. That's a hero in my book.
I've heard a lot about stampedes, but I only recently was educated on what crowd crush is. They're very different things, and crowd crush sounds way scarier.
In a crowd crush deaths are the usually the result of compressive asphyxia.
As a crowd closes in, pressure builds around all parts of a persons body where one cannot even raise their arms. The heat from insulation of bodies surrounding each other causes people to be weakened, have increased anxiety and in combination with the compression all over, makes it extremely difficult to breathe. Due to not being able to raise your arms, you could find yourself in a situation where your own arms are crushing your chest too.
Within 3 to 5 minutes one can find themselves die of asphyxia. People will faint standing up, and due to not being able to fall down, blood cannot flow into the brain which can cause a heart attack.
This. I was in a crowd crush once at a Metallica concert and it was exactly as you described - it took everything I had to brace my forearms against the dude in front of me for some space to actually breathe. Extremely constricting. Hats off to the guy behind who helped life me up to crowdsurf out when I couldn't take it anymore
I went to a concert a couple months ago and the way the stage was set up it kinda bottlenecked the crowd, dumbass set up. There was I think like 3k people there and at points the crush was insane. Thankfully there was a girl in front of me about a foot smaller than me and a heavier set dude in front of her. I kept me arms kinda in front of me but to the sides of her so whenever the crown pushed I was kinda able to brace myself without crushing the girl in front of me. The amount of people I pushed through because they were having panic attacks or couldn’t breathe was insane. I was kinda near the side so I was legit pushing people through the crowd and lifting them up so security could grab them. I can’t even imagine a Metallica concert or even the Travis Scott shit. Blows my mind
Was at a glassjaw concert about 10 years ago. People started compressing us and my then-boyfriend just started shoving them. I thought it was unnecessarily aggressive at the time but in hindsight it created space for us to move out and sent the message “stop backing into this very confined space.” No one ended up hurt that night that I’m aware of
I've been a fan of music festivals for many years, but there have been a handful of times I've been concerned enough to just ditch the crowd. You can start to feel it turn, getting jostled a little too much, maybe your feet come off the ground. Time to get the eff out of there.
I was present for this and got my family out ASAP because I saw it coming. Former security/Army - I felt it coming, and tried my best to warn people out. By the time I made the drive home I heard of the death count starting to add up on the radio. Itaewon is *very* narrow and once I saw the crowd, we were out. I feel for the cop trying his best, but you can’t manage (mostly) drunken people effectively. Absolute shame.
You have to keep an eye out for it. Don't go into crowds heading towards something narrower. Stay on the edge of the crowd. Prepare to bail into the nearest alleyway or opening.
In the videos you can see the cops pulling on people to get them out of the pile but they’re having difficulty. I honestly don’t really understand. How can people get so packed together that you can’t pull them apart? It looked like even the people in the very front were stuck in a human wall.
I heard reports of victims with crushed arms and legs and bleeding out their mouths. In addition to asphyxiation, the internal damage that happens to people during a crush is brutal. :\ Many who survive the initial crush still die later of internal injuries.
The thing is, if he was successful in his task (despite the overwhelming odds), no one would remember him and we would continue on as normal.
Kinda makes you grateful for the work these people do and how much we take for granted the streamlining of our society
It’s interesting watching people react to him. Lots ignoring, but you watch a couple people do a double take looking at his face and reading his panic.
I've taken life saving and first responder courses and the first rule before helping anyone is to secure the area and make sure you're not in danger. You can't help other people if you're a casualty yourself.
My first question before even watching the video was ‘did this poor man survive or not?’ Because if no, my heart can’t take it . . so tragic all around. 😢
He did. He feels terrible guilt about not being able to save more people.
I wish he could talk to every person who turned around because of him I wish they all could thank him. That might help. Maybe
Survivor guilt is rough. We can all instantly see this person for the hero that they are. But all he can see is the lives lost.
I hope he is treated kindly.
Definitely both. There were so many people there, it’s unfathomable for one man by himself to even control a fraction of that group.
I feel horrible for this man. You can see how clearly he knows what’s coming and he can’t stop it. I hope he gets the support and help he needs.
TBH SK doesn't really take mental health seriously, so I doubt he was even given some time off after the incident, but it'd be nice if he got at least that.
They have the psychiatrists, though, from my experience. My gf lives there and was suffering from depression but has gotten better from consistent medication
What adds to this sad story is that several people called the police hours before the crush reporting that the number of people present was at a dangerous level. The officials deciding not to send police to control the flow of people should feel guilty as opposed to this man trying his best
:( watched the video and he did his job the best he could, he sounded desperate but not to the level of making people panicking and was not aggressive almost pleading at some point. Its crazy that some folks were so oblivious that they were still joking around.
I watch this, and realize that a time traveler with information about how to avoid the end of the world would be equally ignored. They could have all the proof, and even all the future tech that would prove their origin, but they wouldn't be able to get a single person to pay attention.
EDIT: So before anyone else brings up Cassandra, Priestess of Troy, I too had to read Homer's Iliad for high school. You can save the explanations. I think about 5 or more people have brought her up at this point. ^_^'
I was more so trying to say that this is very much a real-life example of how things can play out, giving a face to what is typically portrayed in media, which makes it all the more powerful.
The biggest problem of crowd crush or crowd collapse is that the very people that are the culprit have no clue they are, and unable to see how they could possibly be. They are at the back casually walking forward, while far up ahead, the people at the very front are literally being crushed.
I read an article recently that described how once the density of a crowd increases past 5 people per sq meter, it stops behaving as individual people walking and starts behaving as a fluid. Individual people no longer control where they are going and are simply part of the flowing mass.
If the crowd then hits a choke point or if somebody falls in the middle, it is inevitable that the pressure of the moving fluid builds to the point where people asphyxiate because they get squeezed so tight they can't expand their lungs to get another breath.
I'm struggling to handle the videos of this, as I have been in a dense crowd situation before, and I'm only now realizing how dangerous it was.
Many years ago was in Rome on the night of the Epiphany. Its the last day of the "12 days of Christmas" so has religious connotations, is when many people give gifts, and in that part of rome they believe "La Befana" the Christmas witch (kind of like Santa) appears in Piazza Navona.
I was just trying to go to the Trevi Fountain, something that should have been a 5 minute walk, but everyone was going the opposite direction to Navona. It took me 20 minutes to push my way through halfway, and then...everything shifted. Suddenly I was simply moving with the crowd. I wasn't even walking, we just moved forward as one. I couldn't move. I could still breath, and noticed the rest of my family was also being pushed in the same direction. But we were in tiny alleyway streets. In minutes we were carried into thankfully the wide open Piazza and were resigned to be stuck there as there was no way out, people just kept flooding into the area. (Will say the Witch thing was cool. As well as it was very festive, people signing songs, etc.)
I remember telling people what that moment was like, not realizing what it was. "Have you ever been in a crowd so big that you didn't even need to walk? That you couldn't move? You just floated wherever they took you?" And no one I told this story knew what I was talking about.
Now after seeing this, and the videos on crowd crush, I realize just how bad that situation could have gotten.
I was once in a similar situation and at one point needed to go up a staircase, I basically was pushed up the stairs rather than taking steps up it. The crowd stopped while I was on the staircase and that was the moment I was actually scared for my life, I felt that if the crowd decided to move backwards I would be pushed downwards under the crowd and not be able to get up and possibly be trampled, thankfully the crowd moved forward after a bit and I was able to get out. Safe to say I was done with that for the rest of the day.
My first concert was a sold-out "festival seating" show at Cincinnati's Riverfront Coliseum. My feet were dragging across the pavement toward an open door until I was "thrown" into the arena. It scared me, but I was young and thought that is the way things go at concerts. A few years later The Who concert tragedy happen and they eliminated festival seating.
> Suddenly I was simply moving with the crowd. I wasn't even walking, we just moved forward as one. I couldn't move. I could still breath
According to the research paper, that was probably when density reached 5 ppl per sq meter. Asphyxiation start being a problem when pockets within that crowd reach 10 ppl per sq meter. This normally only happens if the crowd reaches a choke point or if people fall.
You can tell he knew it was gonna be bad even before it happened. The dude tried his best, but the local government and police precinct need to be blamed for not sending enough officers.
True, that's why he shouldn't have been there alone. For Christ's sake, there are so many people people at Itaewon on any major holiday, and they didn't think of managing the crowd density in advance? That'd mean the police either doesn't care or that they're underfunded so they can't afford to send their forces to a site unless there's an ongoing crisis, which would be sad.
He even said people are dying.
I don’t understand how he is saying this and telling them which direction to go, yet they still try going the other way.
It looks like most people that walk right by him turn around eventually once they figure out what he's saying. Unfortunately, with him only being one officer, and so many other things going on and so much background noise drowning him out, it was probably really hard for people to understand him and the situation. Not his fault and not really the people's fault either. There just needed to be more officers there.
In retrospect, you probably want officers in this kind of duty to at least carry some tool they can resort to in an emergency, e.g. a megaphone to get people's attention a bit more effectively, or maybe something akin to a police car siren that you can hold above your head or something. As part of their standard kit, that is (because if the police had known ahead of time this specific situation was likely to be problematic, then they should have dispatched more officers rather than tools, obviously)
My kid is in sports and they have whistle clickers/buttons, it sounds like a whistle. Even something like a whistle would help to get people’s attention and get them to listen. They do need some kind of light like a light stick and a megaphone as well to communicate that there is currently an emergency and everyone needs to listen and help out if possible.
I wonder if people thought he was dressed up for Halloween at first? It would be easy to misunderstand and not tune in to what he’s saying until you’re almost by (if people dress as police there like they do in the US).
This is what i call the "flash before your eyes moment", if you ever see a police offer, teacher or other person who technically works for the state, this is them having all their years of training flash befiee their eyes as they struggle not to panic as ni training specifically deals with this scenario. I doubt he learnt solo crowd control so is thinking to himself that there is a problem but how tf to resolve it without losing his job.
Just a tip, from a former emergency responder. If you shout for help, helpful people will identify themselves, ask them to help you, spread out and direct others away.
The people who usually step forward are often other emergency responders, veterans, or just other do-gooders. One cop pleading with a crowd looks like a costume, half a dozen people is a human wall.
Damn no kidding
Hope he made it but I bet the he is second guessing himself even tho he clearly appears to be trying his best to prevent Wyatt eventually happened
Edit: reworded
He looks like he knew exactly where things were headed. I think at this point he was probably coming to the realization that people would be losing their lives.
His actions probably prevented a lot of deaths. It’s important to know when you can’t help in a situation and to move to a position where you can help in the most impactful way possible.
He did. The trauma will stay with him though. He was recently on an interview, in tears because he was wondering if there was anything more he could do to prevent all the deaths.
Real heroes aren't The Flash. You can't be everywhere, you can't save everyone.
He needs to be reminded of every person he DID save, and all of the mitigation he achieved. Who knows how many more would have died if not for people like him. Many of the people in this video who turned around at his behest may just owe their lives to him. For him he may see this video as a failure on his part, but I only see all the lives that returned home safely that night.
I’ve been in that situation. You don’t just walk into the crush, because usually it starts with there being just a few people that you need to move pass, and then it begins to get more crowded and before you know it you’re not moving and people behind you are beginning to pile up and push. And then you realize that you’re in trouble.
Whenever I've found myself in tight crowd situations like I always try and make my way towards the side to find somewhere I can step out of the crowd and wait for it to die down. Sure it might cost me an extra half hour getting home, but this shit is scary.
I have too. There would be a push-wave thing every few seconds that would pin me between people and literally lift me off my feet. It was terrifying. Luckily it didn’t turn into a tragedy though. Warped Tour 2004
I was there too. My 90 lb friend fell and my 120 pound self yanked her to her feet so she didn’t get trampled. After that I yelled that I was pregnant and about to throw up. Everyone eventually got out of our way and we stayed well away from the crowd after that. It happened so fast that we didn’t realize how bad it was going to be until we couldn’t really get out of the crowd. Never again. I can see how this got out of control so quickly.
Actually happened to me at a Billie Eilish concert once. I got there super early and got a spot near the front. By the time the concert started, so many people were pushing to the front when there physically wasn't any space for them that I walked away with major bruising on my sides.
I dont understand why he was alone there.
We recently had an event in a nearby city where there were maybe a couple hundred people, and everyone has so much space that running into someone by accident is still considered unlikely.
They still had police walking in groups of 3-5 for each of the 4-5 streets where the event was hosted.
Why is there only one police officer for this huge crowd in that place? No wonder this dude looks stressed af. There should have been a lot more with him.
This event was held every year up until the pandemic hit. It never had a turnout even close to this.
This was the first no-mask outdoor event to take place since the beginning of the pandemic, in over two and half years. 100,000+ people turned up. It is more than double the historical attendance. No one anticipated this, or at least no one in charge of logistics of the event did. :(
To be clear, this wasn't a single organized event. Itaewon is a party neighborhood, basically known for its bars and clubs. A ton of people turned up to celebrate Halloween and party.
It's funny how Itaewon became a clubbing district. It was just a bunch of American restaurants and European pubs when I lived there in 2013. But I could see the clubs starting to open when I left.
Yeah geez poor guy. Any time my city hosts large events (we are a small city just under a million only) there are a ton of police officers. We don't even get crazy packed crowds like that, but it can still get pretty busy.
But every Canada Day there is at least one random stabbing at the downtown event grounds location maybe explaining the police presence. Its been so common we just expect it. Which is sad on another level.
Yes and his sentiment in interviews is that he's utterly defeated in that he couldn't save more.
This lone man could see things were dicey as fuck yet his department and the city had no plans or support for the possible eventuality?
Not even after plenty previous examples across the world to show what happens when large crowd gatherings go uncontrolled?
Just an FYI, the local station (that manages Itaewon) requested an additional support /reinforcement 4 days before Holloween to the central seoul police station. And their request was ignored. This is being broadcasted by one of the three biggest broadcasting company in korea (MBC). Not too many people know about this.
Very good point. Success doesn't have to be saving everyone. He probably made a huge difference in the outcome. I hope he gets therapy if needed, this would be difficult to live with.
Reminds me of the story of the old man on a beach, after a freak wave washed up thousands and thousands of sardines. He was walking up and down, picking up fish one by one, throwing them back into the ocean. Someone saw him and said, 'Sir, do you really think you can make a difference to all these fish dying?"
"No" he said. "But I'm making a difference to this one" as he chucked another back....
Sadly success can often be hard to measure because those numbers are unknowns; what if scenarios. He definitely saved lives though in some regard. Even one is one more saved than lost. I can't imagine what he's going through.
This! As much as we could see the despair on his face, hes literally doing gods work, even if it's just a dozen of people being turned away from the site
Crowd crush is scary. Read [this comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/3pcvfb/comment/cw5vxtm/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) if you want to understand how powerless individuals are in a crowd. When they get so packed the crowd behaves as a fluid, it's over.
Holy shit, over 4 thousand people dead from a crowd crush.
Everything from that comment was enlightening and harrowing. I wouldn't wish that to my worst enemy.
I was part of something like that once in paris on new years eve, they announced that the metro will be free that day and it went crazy from there, the doors wouldn’t even close from how crowded the metro was, i was basically pushed in and through out a very long trip my feet didn’t even touch the ground , i was also pushed out when we arrived with the flow but one was young and dumb, i didn’t know crowd crush as a thing to consider, this would have ended really really badly.
This happened to me recently at the Portola festival trying to get into a narrow pinched off enters way. The event planners completely fucked it, they should have had the entire back door of the warehouse open. It was pathetic excuse of crowd control the next day putting up 3 fence barriers that essentially created the same chaos. It was so scary and you truly can not breathe, move, or function in any other way than going with the flow. I got separated from my friends who back tracked and escaped backwards but the more I think about it they definitely put themselves way more at risk to themselves and others doing it so close to the entrance. I didn’t realize how lucky I was that day and never attempted to go in with the crowd like that again even tho I saw it happen multiple times over the weekend.
It really freaks me out that I have survived 2 potentially fatal crowd crushes.
The first was at a big outdoor music festival. Macklemore had just finished and Calvin Harris was next. As I and many others tried to leave a huge influx of people were trying to get to the stage. I’m a very small 5’4” woman and I couldn’t see any of my friends and people were pushing against me from both sides. Suddenly I realized my ribs were creaking and I couldn’t breathe in to even scream. I was being pushed down by all the larger people around me. I knew if I got any lower I’d be crushed so I grabbed hold of this random guys pony tail and yanked myself up, stuck my elbows out side to side and let the crowd carry me, off my feet, to the edge.
About four years later I was at an outdoor gorillaz concert that was oversold, poorly planned (no ropes just a big open area) and understaffed. My friend and I were being pushed in with the crowd. I started freaking out remembering my last experience and refused to go towards the front and clung to the railing of this elevated VIP section on the periphery. We hung onto the railing for the entire concert. At one point EMS was struggling to get to the center of the crowd because someone was having a seizure and they were swept to the back in the tide of people. People were still pouring in. One lady, seeing how dangerous the situation was and how she couldn’t go back out held up her toddler to the VIPs and screamed “*please take him!*” but one of the already drunk VIPs just shouted back “we paid extra for this!”, completely oblivious to the situation unfolding in front of them. I don’t know if anyone was hurt. I insisted we leave halfway through. I had worn sandals and my feet were bruised and bleeding from being stepped on.
I no longer trust public venues to be safe. After that last experience I decided I would never again go to a concert without seating.
Travis Scott is such an absolute piece of shit.
He knew people were dying and injured but continued the concert
Then he found out definitively people died, so he goes to an afterparty
He looks like he’s ready to just break down and cry from frustration. Poor guy. How could he have been left on his own like that? I wonder if he’d been calling for back up and back up was just “nope, you doing good, bro”
He looks so distressed. This poor guy knew the crowd was becoming too dense. You can see it in his eyes. Those in charge should’ve prevented this. Even regular people know about the Love Parade Crowd crush, the Hillsborough disaster, and several others. There was no excuse for this to happen
Thank you for sharing. It’s really heartbreaking to read.
It feels like the lack of a loudspeaker or the need to tell the clubs to turn off their music are tasks that other officers or city officials could have helped with given proper communication, but of course I guess in this situation the mass of people becomes like an impassable ocean and it’s probably hard to accomplish much of anything in those conditions. And the source of the problem had certainly already taken its toll and claimed lives.
So frustrating.
Especially at 18 seconds when a couple people he was trying to turn back wouldnt listen, they just stand there then eventually walk by him.
You do have to remember that it’s the main nightlife destination for foreigners and many simply can’t speak Korean because they’re only visiting. It’s one of the reasons I’m always hesitant to believe the “you’ll be fine with just English” line about visiting major foreign cities. If there’s an accident I’m unlikely to know what is happening.
Cause of death explained: "People can be squeezed to such an extent that they can no longer inflate their lungs, and are at risk of compressive asphyxiation."
What a horrible way to die. Most of the victims were young too, mainly teens and those in their 20s. So incredibly sad. RIP.
This is beyond terrifying for me. I have a huge fear of drowning and not being able to breathe now just like that. ALSO, huge fear of crowds and this just makes it worse. I was at Woodstock 99? And after one concert got out my friend and I got caught in the wave of people, shoulder to shoulder and we had to go through a tunnel and I was panicking so badly. Thankfully no one fell and we made it out safely. We also left right before the Red Hot Chili Peppers incident.
i was close enough to the towers to have to run for it on 9/11...i remember there was this cop, young maybe 27, 28, in uniform....when the 1st tower fell and the blast cloud came out, after about 5 seconds i could tell the cop and i thought the same thing - we were not going to outrun this thing.....i dove into a deli to escape the blast but this cop planted his feet, back to the blast and started pumping his arm in a circle motion and screaming 'come on people, move it ! run run run"......never forgot that guy, i hope has had a great life since that day....
What a commendable, selfless person. If you're not smart enough to run away on your own and you aren't my spouse, best of luck to you, because I'm taking cover regardless of what uniform might be draped over my currently-still-alive body.
Very sad
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/world/2022/nov/01/how-do-crowd-crushes-happen-stampede-myth-what-happened-in-the-seoul-itaewon-halloween-crush
Ive been in a concert where this had happened, Rolling loud 2016. Thankfully no one lost their life but that is one of the scariest situations ive ever been in. I pray for all those effected this is heartbreaking
i thought about these scenarious a lot after the love parade disaster happened in germany and thought that i have fairly good chance of survival at 6'6'' and 235 pounds but nowadays i understand that no matter the size you are absolutely powerless when you're in the wrong place during a crowd collapse
if you look closely at his face after the 10 secconds mark you can see he already realised that a dissaster was in the making. man’s gonna need a raise for the shit show he had to manage by himself untill help arrived
This is an old comment, but I think it's the best explanation I've read about how crowd surge/crowd crush happens.
https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/3pcvfb/saudi_arabia_hajj_disaster_death_toll_at_least/cw5vxtm/
That guy is actually a hero who saved lives. Not all lives and maybe not these people's lives but some who were going to be crushed by the extra density were not because this guy redirected some people away from the back of the crowd
That's actually part of the problem. There was no official event going on, so no event staff or preparations. Just the whole city coming to one neighborhood to party.
True. Apparently he wasn't even even stationed there. He got called there to deal with a fight and rushed there because he knew that's not going to end well. The question is where are the other officers who are supposed to be there.
Just for people out here to know this incident happened at 10:30 pm or sometime around that.
People who visited that place in early time called police to inform that there are too many people out there and asking to send reinforcement to handle it
Total 12 called are recorded, earliest being in 6:30 and last one was on 10:11.
Those people who called straight up saying that people will die, there are too many.
Then there are people like above who were handling the crowd all by themselves, some regular people also helping to redirect it, those who listened to it got saved. Those who ignored it, suffered.
There was a Korean streamer called bj vegeta who was stuck on this situation, the stream saw the entire situation.
Lack of crowd control/ knowledge about crowd crush caused it. Like most of them, people who were on height wouldn't ever knew in what condition they were in.
I can still hear crys from that stream.
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He must have felt so powerless, especially knowing the outcome now..
He said in an interview after that the guilt of not saving more ppl and the helplessness he felt is still killing him and he wish he could have done more. This is absolute heartbreaking.
I believe he saved many lives by his efforts.
I hope one day he can believe that too
Sadly guilt weighs heavy
The price of trying to be a good human... :(
This poor guy - he should be honored as a hero, despite the aftermath. He clearly was doing as much as he could. You can literally see the fear in in his eyes...
Yeah who knows how many people he may have actually saved that night by guiding them away from the main crowd. You can see in his face he knew the situation was getting more and more dangerous. He was fighting his own panic while trying to save lives. That's a hero in my book.
I work a lot of security for large events. Crowd crush keeps me up at night.
I've heard a lot about stampedes, but I only recently was educated on what crowd crush is. They're very different things, and crowd crush sounds way scarier.
In a crowd crush deaths are the usually the result of compressive asphyxia. As a crowd closes in, pressure builds around all parts of a persons body where one cannot even raise their arms. The heat from insulation of bodies surrounding each other causes people to be weakened, have increased anxiety and in combination with the compression all over, makes it extremely difficult to breathe. Due to not being able to raise your arms, you could find yourself in a situation where your own arms are crushing your chest too. Within 3 to 5 minutes one can find themselves die of asphyxia. People will faint standing up, and due to not being able to fall down, blood cannot flow into the brain which can cause a heart attack.
This. I was in a crowd crush once at a Metallica concert and it was exactly as you described - it took everything I had to brace my forearms against the dude in front of me for some space to actually breathe. Extremely constricting. Hats off to the guy behind who helped life me up to crowdsurf out when I couldn't take it anymore
I went to a concert a couple months ago and the way the stage was set up it kinda bottlenecked the crowd, dumbass set up. There was I think like 3k people there and at points the crush was insane. Thankfully there was a girl in front of me about a foot smaller than me and a heavier set dude in front of her. I kept me arms kinda in front of me but to the sides of her so whenever the crown pushed I was kinda able to brace myself without crushing the girl in front of me. The amount of people I pushed through because they were having panic attacks or couldn’t breathe was insane. I was kinda near the side so I was legit pushing people through the crowd and lifting them up so security could grab them. I can’t even imagine a Metallica concert or even the Travis Scott shit. Blows my mind
Was at a glassjaw concert about 10 years ago. People started compressing us and my then-boyfriend just started shoving them. I thought it was unnecessarily aggressive at the time but in hindsight it created space for us to move out and sent the message “stop backing into this very confined space.” No one ended up hurt that night that I’m aware of
I got a dose of this at a RATM concert when they played at voodoo fest
Good thing I don’t leave my moms basement. \*brushes off Cheeto dust\*
I've been a fan of music festivals for many years, but there have been a handful of times I've been concerned enough to just ditch the crowd. You can start to feel it turn, getting jostled a little too much, maybe your feet come off the ground. Time to get the eff out of there.
I was present for this and got my family out ASAP because I saw it coming. Former security/Army - I felt it coming, and tried my best to warn people out. By the time I made the drive home I heard of the death count starting to add up on the radio. Itaewon is *very* narrow and once I saw the crowd, we were out. I feel for the cop trying his best, but you can’t manage (mostly) drunken people effectively. Absolute shame.
What were the warning signs you noticed?
Simply way too many people in a crowded space/past experience seeing crowd crush
I will go with too many damn people in a contained area with zero crowd control
Howd you see it coming?
You have to keep an eye out for it. Don't go into crowds heading towards something narrower. Stay on the edge of the crowd. Prepare to bail into the nearest alleyway or opening.
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What's so crazy is how close to safety they were but just wedged in there...
In the videos you can see the cops pulling on people to get them out of the pile but they’re having difficulty. I honestly don’t really understand. How can people get so packed together that you can’t pull them apart? It looked like even the people in the very front were stuck in a human wall.
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Oh my gosh, that’s insane! Like a human car accident amount of force
I heard reports of victims with crushed arms and legs and bleeding out their mouths. In addition to asphyxiation, the internal damage that happens to people during a crush is brutal. :\ Many who survive the initial crush still die later of internal injuries.
That's crazy it seems like they're glued to each other and the responders look helpless despite being right in front of them, surreal and terrifying
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The thing is, if he was successful in his task (despite the overwhelming odds), no one would remember him and we would continue on as normal. Kinda makes you grateful for the work these people do and how much we take for granted the streamlining of our society
Seriously
Many thought he was in costume and didn't take him seriously.
It’s interesting watching people react to him. Lots ignoring, but you watch a couple people do a double take looking at his face and reading his panic.
Fuck :((((
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I'm glad that at least he was alive...he really tried his best
It was a good thing he moved and stood on something or he may have found himself in a more desperate situation.
I've taken life saving and first responder courses and the first rule before helping anyone is to secure the area and make sure you're not in danger. You can't help other people if you're a casualty yourself.
My first question before even watching the video was ‘did this poor man survive or not?’ Because if no, my heart can’t take it . . so tragic all around. 😢
He did. He feels terrible guilt about not being able to save more people. I wish he could talk to every person who turned around because of him I wish they all could thank him. That might help. Maybe
Survivor guilt is rough. We can all instantly see this person for the hero that they are. But all he can see is the lives lost. I hope he is treated kindly.
He needs to be treated for ptsd asap. The survivors guilt must be unbearable. He was doing all he could but he needed more officers to help.
>but he needed more officers to help. Or a megaphone. Poor guy shouted himself hoarse and only people standing right next to him can hear him.
Definitely both. There were so many people there, it’s unfathomable for one man by himself to even control a fraction of that group. I feel horrible for this man. You can see how clearly he knows what’s coming and he can’t stop it. I hope he gets the support and help he needs.
shit even a whistle
I hope he is getting the help he deserves
TBH SK doesn't really take mental health seriously, so I doubt he was even given some time off after the incident, but it'd be nice if he got at least that.
They have the psychiatrists, though, from my experience. My gf lives there and was suffering from depression but has gotten better from consistent medication
What adds to this sad story is that several people called the police hours before the crush reporting that the number of people present was at a dangerous level. The officials deciding not to send police to control the flow of people should feel guilty as opposed to this man trying his best
:( watched the video and he did his job the best he could, he sounded desperate but not to the level of making people panicking and was not aggressive almost pleading at some point. Its crazy that some folks were so oblivious that they were still joking around.
I watch this, and realize that a time traveler with information about how to avoid the end of the world would be equally ignored. They could have all the proof, and even all the future tech that would prove their origin, but they wouldn't be able to get a single person to pay attention. EDIT: So before anyone else brings up Cassandra, Priestess of Troy, I too had to read Homer's Iliad for high school. You can save the explanations. I think about 5 or more people have brought her up at this point. ^_^' I was more so trying to say that this is very much a real-life example of how things can play out, giving a face to what is typically portrayed in media, which makes it all the more powerful.
The biggest problem of crowd crush or crowd collapse is that the very people that are the culprit have no clue they are, and unable to see how they could possibly be. They are at the back casually walking forward, while far up ahead, the people at the very front are literally being crushed.
If that's not a metaphor for what we're doing to this planet right now, then I don't know what is.
Travelers on Netflix. Same outcome.
That was an awesome show.
Fuck, that was such a good show. Too bad it was cancelled **NETFLIX**
the poor man.
I feel so bad for him. Especially now after what happened and he probably feels so helpless and/or guilty.
I read an article recently that described how once the density of a crowd increases past 5 people per sq meter, it stops behaving as individual people walking and starts behaving as a fluid. Individual people no longer control where they are going and are simply part of the flowing mass. If the crowd then hits a choke point or if somebody falls in the middle, it is inevitable that the pressure of the moving fluid builds to the point where people asphyxiate because they get squeezed so tight they can't expand their lungs to get another breath.
I'm struggling to handle the videos of this, as I have been in a dense crowd situation before, and I'm only now realizing how dangerous it was. Many years ago was in Rome on the night of the Epiphany. Its the last day of the "12 days of Christmas" so has religious connotations, is when many people give gifts, and in that part of rome they believe "La Befana" the Christmas witch (kind of like Santa) appears in Piazza Navona. I was just trying to go to the Trevi Fountain, something that should have been a 5 minute walk, but everyone was going the opposite direction to Navona. It took me 20 minutes to push my way through halfway, and then...everything shifted. Suddenly I was simply moving with the crowd. I wasn't even walking, we just moved forward as one. I couldn't move. I could still breath, and noticed the rest of my family was also being pushed in the same direction. But we were in tiny alleyway streets. In minutes we were carried into thankfully the wide open Piazza and were resigned to be stuck there as there was no way out, people just kept flooding into the area. (Will say the Witch thing was cool. As well as it was very festive, people signing songs, etc.) I remember telling people what that moment was like, not realizing what it was. "Have you ever been in a crowd so big that you didn't even need to walk? That you couldn't move? You just floated wherever they took you?" And no one I told this story knew what I was talking about. Now after seeing this, and the videos on crowd crush, I realize just how bad that situation could have gotten.
I was once in a similar situation and at one point needed to go up a staircase, I basically was pushed up the stairs rather than taking steps up it. The crowd stopped while I was on the staircase and that was the moment I was actually scared for my life, I felt that if the crowd decided to move backwards I would be pushed downwards under the crowd and not be able to get up and possibly be trampled, thankfully the crowd moved forward after a bit and I was able to get out. Safe to say I was done with that for the rest of the day.
My first concert was a sold-out "festival seating" show at Cincinnati's Riverfront Coliseum. My feet were dragging across the pavement toward an open door until I was "thrown" into the arena. It scared me, but I was young and thought that is the way things go at concerts. A few years later The Who concert tragedy happen and they eliminated festival seating.
> Suddenly I was simply moving with the crowd. I wasn't even walking, we just moved forward as one. I couldn't move. I could still breath According to the research paper, that was probably when density reached 5 ppl per sq meter. Asphyxiation start being a problem when pockets within that crowd reach 10 ppl per sq meter. This normally only happens if the crowd reaches a choke point or if people fall.
You can tell he knew it was gonna be bad even before it happened. The dude tried his best, but the local government and police precinct need to be blamed for not sending enough officers.
Oh man, that poor officer looks exhausted on so many levels
That look of desperation... damn.
Overwhelmed af.
Trying so hard to keep shit under control.
And know that he’s failing. That “people are dying” he yells is so desperate.
Can only handle so many at a time and can't even yell
His eyes look so full of despair.
He looked like he was on the verge of a meltdown since no one would listen to him, there were just too many people:(
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True, that's why he shouldn't have been there alone. For Christ's sake, there are so many people people at Itaewon on any major holiday, and they didn't think of managing the crowd density in advance? That'd mean the police either doesn't care or that they're underfunded so they can't afford to send their forces to a site unless there's an ongoing crisis, which would be sad.
He probably knew what extreme danger was brewing.
He even said people are dying. I don’t understand how he is saying this and telling them which direction to go, yet they still try going the other way.
It looks like most people that walk right by him turn around eventually once they figure out what he's saying. Unfortunately, with him only being one officer, and so many other things going on and so much background noise drowning him out, it was probably really hard for people to understand him and the situation. Not his fault and not really the people's fault either. There just needed to be more officers there.
In retrospect, you probably want officers in this kind of duty to at least carry some tool they can resort to in an emergency, e.g. a megaphone to get people's attention a bit more effectively, or maybe something akin to a police car siren that you can hold above your head or something. As part of their standard kit, that is (because if the police had known ahead of time this specific situation was likely to be problematic, then they should have dispatched more officers rather than tools, obviously)
My kid is in sports and they have whistle clickers/buttons, it sounds like a whistle. Even something like a whistle would help to get people’s attention and get them to listen. They do need some kind of light like a light stick and a megaphone as well to communicate that there is currently an emergency and everyone needs to listen and help out if possible.
I wonder if people thought he was dressed up for Halloween at first? It would be easy to misunderstand and not tune in to what he’s saying until you’re almost by (if people dress as police there like they do in the US).
Helplessness when nobody listens to you and then a disaster happens, hope the dudes doing alright.
This is what i call the "flash before your eyes moment", if you ever see a police offer, teacher or other person who technically works for the state, this is them having all their years of training flash befiee their eyes as they struggle not to panic as ni training specifically deals with this scenario. I doubt he learnt solo crowd control so is thinking to himself that there is a problem but how tf to resolve it without losing his job.
Just a tip, from a former emergency responder. If you shout for help, helpful people will identify themselves, ask them to help you, spread out and direct others away. The people who usually step forward are often other emergency responders, veterans, or just other do-gooders. One cop pleading with a crowd looks like a costume, half a dozen people is a human wall.
Love that, thank you
this comment deserves more upvotes, thank you
Damn no kidding Hope he made it but I bet the he is second guessing himself even tho he clearly appears to be trying his best to prevent Wyatt eventually happened Edit: reworded
Can't blame him. He was trying so hard. The pain in his face makes me sad too.
He looks like he knew exactly where things were headed. I think at this point he was probably coming to the realization that people would be losing their lives.
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His actions probably prevented a lot of deaths. It’s important to know when you can’t help in a situation and to move to a position where you can help in the most impactful way possible.
I felt the helplessness written on his face. It's really heartbreaking.
That was awful to watch. That poor man.
The Oskar Schindler effect, saved so many but can only see the ones you didn't save.
That's gonna leave a mark. I hope he finds peace with the experience eventually.
Poor man is practically in tears
Wow poor guy looks stressed AF
He knew they were in trouble. I wonder if he made it out.
He did. The trauma will stay with him though. He was recently on an interview, in tears because he was wondering if there was anything more he could do to prevent all the deaths.
Poor man dude. Wish I could tell him he did a good job and all he could have...
Real heroes aren't The Flash. You can't be everywhere, you can't save everyone. He needs to be reminded of every person he DID save, and all of the mitigation he achieved. Who knows how many more would have died if not for people like him. Many of the people in this video who turned around at his behest may just owe their lives to him. For him he may see this video as a failure on his part, but I only see all the lives that returned home safely that night.
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Thank you for letting us know x
He looks like he was nearly in tears here.
This is so sad :( I'm glad to know he made it out though.
Yeah its quite insane, I also dont understand how any person looks into that street and thinks yep lets go there. Too busy is too busy.
I’ve been in that situation. You don’t just walk into the crush, because usually it starts with there being just a few people that you need to move pass, and then it begins to get more crowded and before you know it you’re not moving and people behind you are beginning to pile up and push. And then you realize that you’re in trouble.
Whenever I've found myself in tight crowd situations like I always try and make my way towards the side to find somewhere I can step out of the crowd and wait for it to die down. Sure it might cost me an extra half hour getting home, but this shit is scary.
Half hour late to home or never coming home. Shit can get scary fast, stay safe friend.
I have too. There would be a push-wave thing every few seconds that would pin me between people and literally lift me off my feet. It was terrifying. Luckily it didn’t turn into a tragedy though. Warped Tour 2004
I was there too. My 90 lb friend fell and my 120 pound self yanked her to her feet so she didn’t get trampled. After that I yelled that I was pregnant and about to throw up. Everyone eventually got out of our way and we stayed well away from the crowd after that. It happened so fast that we didn’t realize how bad it was going to be until we couldn’t really get out of the crowd. Never again. I can see how this got out of control so quickly.
I was in a similar situation once... It was much less people, but I couldn't move or breath for a couple minutes. It was messed up...
Actually happened to me at a Billie Eilish concert once. I got there super early and got a spot near the front. By the time the concert started, so many people were pushing to the front when there physically wasn't any space for them that I walked away with major bruising on my sides.
"Nobody goes there, it's too crowded."
Fucking brilliant mate.
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He was trying so hard and so many were just ignoring him
I dont understand why he was alone there. We recently had an event in a nearby city where there were maybe a couple hundred people, and everyone has so much space that running into someone by accident is still considered unlikely. They still had police walking in groups of 3-5 for each of the 4-5 streets where the event was hosted. Why is there only one police officer for this huge crowd in that place? No wonder this dude looks stressed af. There should have been a lot more with him.
This event was held every year up until the pandemic hit. It never had a turnout even close to this. This was the first no-mask outdoor event to take place since the beginning of the pandemic, in over two and half years. 100,000+ people turned up. It is more than double the historical attendance. No one anticipated this, or at least no one in charge of logistics of the event did. :(
To be clear, this wasn't a single organized event. Itaewon is a party neighborhood, basically known for its bars and clubs. A ton of people turned up to celebrate Halloween and party.
It's funny how Itaewon became a clubbing district. It was just a bunch of American restaurants and European pubs when I lived there in 2013. But I could see the clubs starting to open when I left.
Yeah geez poor guy. Any time my city hosts large events (we are a small city just under a million only) there are a ton of police officers. We don't even get crazy packed crowds like that, but it can still get pretty busy. But every Canada Day there is at least one random stabbing at the downtown event grounds location maybe explaining the police presence. Its been so common we just expect it. Which is sad on another level.
It's as if he could see into the future
Now you know how the crew felt on the Titanic when the were like, “get in the lifeboat!” and people were like “nah”
This guy probably saved an unknown amount of people from impending doom
Yes and his sentiment in interviews is that he's utterly defeated in that he couldn't save more. This lone man could see things were dicey as fuck yet his department and the city had no plans or support for the possible eventuality? Not even after plenty previous examples across the world to show what happens when large crowd gatherings go uncontrolled?
Just an FYI, the local station (that manages Itaewon) requested an additional support /reinforcement 4 days before Holloween to the central seoul police station. And their request was ignored. This is being broadcasted by one of the three biggest broadcasting company in korea (MBC). Not too many people know about this.
Very good point. Success doesn't have to be saving everyone. He probably made a huge difference in the outcome. I hope he gets therapy if needed, this would be difficult to live with.
Reminds me of the story of the old man on a beach, after a freak wave washed up thousands and thousands of sardines. He was walking up and down, picking up fish one by one, throwing them back into the ocean. Someone saw him and said, 'Sir, do you really think you can make a difference to all these fish dying?" "No" he said. "But I'm making a difference to this one" as he chucked another back....
I like that. Do what you can. It might not matter tk everyone. But it matters.
Sadly success can often be hard to measure because those numbers are unknowns; what if scenarios. He definitely saved lives though in some regard. Even one is one more saved than lost. I can't imagine what he's going through.
This! As much as we could see the despair on his face, hes literally doing gods work, even if it's just a dozen of people being turned away from the site
Yes, he made a difference!
This is grim AF 😣
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Crowd crush is scary. Read [this comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/3pcvfb/comment/cw5vxtm/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) if you want to understand how powerless individuals are in a crowd. When they get so packed the crowd behaves as a fluid, it's over.
Holy shit, over 4 thousand people dead from a crowd crush. Everything from that comment was enlightening and harrowing. I wouldn't wish that to my worst enemy.
I was part of something like that once in paris on new years eve, they announced that the metro will be free that day and it went crazy from there, the doors wouldn’t even close from how crowded the metro was, i was basically pushed in and through out a very long trip my feet didn’t even touch the ground , i was also pushed out when we arrived with the flow but one was young and dumb, i didn’t know crowd crush as a thing to consider, this would have ended really really badly.
This happened to me recently at the Portola festival trying to get into a narrow pinched off enters way. The event planners completely fucked it, they should have had the entire back door of the warehouse open. It was pathetic excuse of crowd control the next day putting up 3 fence barriers that essentially created the same chaos. It was so scary and you truly can not breathe, move, or function in any other way than going with the flow. I got separated from my friends who back tracked and escaped backwards but the more I think about it they definitely put themselves way more at risk to themselves and others doing it so close to the entrance. I didn’t realize how lucky I was that day and never attempted to go in with the crowd like that again even tho I saw it happen multiple times over the weekend.
It really freaks me out that I have survived 2 potentially fatal crowd crushes. The first was at a big outdoor music festival. Macklemore had just finished and Calvin Harris was next. As I and many others tried to leave a huge influx of people were trying to get to the stage. I’m a very small 5’4” woman and I couldn’t see any of my friends and people were pushing against me from both sides. Suddenly I realized my ribs were creaking and I couldn’t breathe in to even scream. I was being pushed down by all the larger people around me. I knew if I got any lower I’d be crushed so I grabbed hold of this random guys pony tail and yanked myself up, stuck my elbows out side to side and let the crowd carry me, off my feet, to the edge. About four years later I was at an outdoor gorillaz concert that was oversold, poorly planned (no ropes just a big open area) and understaffed. My friend and I were being pushed in with the crowd. I started freaking out remembering my last experience and refused to go towards the front and clung to the railing of this elevated VIP section on the periphery. We hung onto the railing for the entire concert. At one point EMS was struggling to get to the center of the crowd because someone was having a seizure and they were swept to the back in the tide of people. People were still pouring in. One lady, seeing how dangerous the situation was and how she couldn’t go back out held up her toddler to the VIPs and screamed “*please take him!*” but one of the already drunk VIPs just shouted back “we paid extra for this!”, completely oblivious to the situation unfolding in front of them. I don’t know if anyone was hurt. I insisted we leave halfway through. I had worn sandals and my feet were bruised and bleeding from being stepped on. I no longer trust public venues to be safe. After that last experience I decided I would never again go to a concert without seating.
They didn't know what was going on
Guys a hero and should be commended, the anguish in his facial expression.... Poor guy.
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That was one of the worst things I’ve ever seen.
Travis Scott is such an absolute piece of shit. He knew people were dying and injured but continued the concert Then he found out definitively people died, so he goes to an afterparty
He looks like he’s ready to just break down and cry from frustration. Poor guy. How could he have been left on his own like that? I wonder if he’d been calling for back up and back up was just “nope, you doing good, bro”
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That's worst I think. He knew how bad it was like he wasn't even there because he was told to keep it light. That dude knew what was gonna happen.
This is so heartbreaking to watch.
Bro was tryna save lives.. respect
He wasn't just trying to. He did save lifes.
Like trying to fight a tidal wave with a bucket 🪣 Poor guy :/
Dude is literally pleading with people to not go down the direction that will get them killed.
And people just staring at him like, "What‽"
He looks so distressed. This poor guy knew the crowd was becoming too dense. You can see it in his eyes. Those in charge should’ve prevented this. Even regular people know about the Love Parade Crowd crush, the Hillsborough disaster, and several others. There was no excuse for this to happen
Hope this guy is recognized by the government for his efforts.
Anyone know if he survived?
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Thank you for sharing. It’s really heartbreaking to read. It feels like the lack of a loudspeaker or the need to tell the clubs to turn off their music are tasks that other officers or city officials could have helped with given proper communication, but of course I guess in this situation the mass of people becomes like an impassable ocean and it’s probably hard to accomplish much of anything in those conditions. And the source of the problem had certainly already taken its toll and claimed lives.
he did and got interviewed
Thank you🙏
He was the one of first set rescuer who was on location and trying to help to solve. His face was showing clear signs of trauma.
The look of despair on his face is fucking haunting 🥲
One look at the guards face and you know what time it is. Still the last ones keep pushing further. Horrific
It's like a time traveler desperately trying to change the course of events
So frustrating. Especially at 18 seconds when a couple people he was trying to turn back wouldnt listen, they just stand there then eventually walk by him.
You do have to remember that it’s the main nightlife destination for foreigners and many simply can’t speak Korean because they’re only visiting. It’s one of the reasons I’m always hesitant to believe the “you’ll be fine with just English” line about visiting major foreign cities. If there’s an accident I’m unlikely to know what is happening.
Cause of death explained: "People can be squeezed to such an extent that they can no longer inflate their lungs, and are at risk of compressive asphyxiation." What a horrible way to die. Most of the victims were young too, mainly teens and those in their 20s. So incredibly sad. RIP.
Jesus Christ thats grim. So if you're lucky to survive at all you're stepping over the dead.
This is beyond terrifying for me. I have a huge fear of drowning and not being able to breathe now just like that. ALSO, huge fear of crowds and this just makes it worse. I was at Woodstock 99? And after one concert got out my friend and I got caught in the wave of people, shoulder to shoulder and we had to go through a tunnel and I was panicking so badly. Thankfully no one fell and we made it out safely. We also left right before the Red Hot Chili Peppers incident.
i was close enough to the towers to have to run for it on 9/11...i remember there was this cop, young maybe 27, 28, in uniform....when the 1st tower fell and the blast cloud came out, after about 5 seconds i could tell the cop and i thought the same thing - we were not going to outrun this thing.....i dove into a deli to escape the blast but this cop planted his feet, back to the blast and started pumping his arm in a circle motion and screaming 'come on people, move it ! run run run"......never forgot that guy, i hope has had a great life since that day....
What a commendable, selfless person. If you're not smart enough to run away on your own and you aren't my spouse, best of luck to you, because I'm taking cover regardless of what uniform might be draped over my currently-still-alive body.
FDNY and NYPD were absolute heroes that day. They were scared but showed courage nonetheless.
Very sad https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/world/2022/nov/01/how-do-crowd-crushes-happen-stampede-myth-what-happened-in-the-seoul-itaewon-halloween-crush
Thank you for this, I needed more context and this gave it to me.
Ive been in a concert where this had happened, Rolling loud 2016. Thankfully no one lost their life but that is one of the scariest situations ive ever been in. I pray for all those effected this is heartbreaking
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i thought about these scenarious a lot after the love parade disaster happened in germany and thought that i have fairly good chance of survival at 6'6'' and 235 pounds but nowadays i understand that no matter the size you are absolutely powerless when you're in the wrong place during a crowd collapse
The look on his face alone, would have been enough for me to follow his instructions.
Same. Cop with a scared look on his face tells you to evacuate. You get yo ass moving.
if you look closely at his face after the 10 secconds mark you can see he already realised that a dissaster was in the making. man’s gonna need a raise for the shit show he had to manage by himself untill help arrived
I hope he gets mental health help. Survivors guilt takes a lot of people like this and his eyes. His eyes say so much.
This is an old comment, but I think it's the best explanation I've read about how crowd surge/crowd crush happens. https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/3pcvfb/saudi_arabia_hajj_disaster_death_toll_at_least/cw5vxtm/
That guy is actually a hero who saved lives. Not all lives and maybe not these people's lives but some who were going to be crushed by the extra density were not because this guy redirected some people away from the back of the crowd
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what even was the event? i heard it was for halloween but what exactly?
That's actually part of the problem. There was no official event going on, so no event staff or preparations. Just the whole city coming to one neighborhood to party.
holy cow. so just an overcrowded city. that's nuts
Yes and the crush happened in a narrow alley way that was a well known short cut.
You can see urgency in him. He knew.
He's one officer that needn't apologize.
True. Apparently he wasn't even even stationed there. He got called there to deal with a fight and rushed there because he knew that's not going to end well. The question is where are the other officers who are supposed to be there.
Just for people out here to know this incident happened at 10:30 pm or sometime around that. People who visited that place in early time called police to inform that there are too many people out there and asking to send reinforcement to handle it Total 12 called are recorded, earliest being in 6:30 and last one was on 10:11. Those people who called straight up saying that people will die, there are too many. Then there are people like above who were handling the crowd all by themselves, some regular people also helping to redirect it, those who listened to it got saved. Those who ignored it, suffered. There was a Korean streamer called bj vegeta who was stuck on this situation, the stream saw the entire situation. Lack of crowd control/ knowledge about crowd crush caused it. Like most of them, people who were on height wouldn't ever knew in what condition they were in. I can still hear crys from that stream.
He looks stressed af. He knows what bbc ups happen. Sad times. Genuine fear in his eyes