On November 5, a Travis Scott Astroworld concert took place in Houston Texas. Members of a huge crowd surged toward the stage and were crushed against each other. At least 8 were killed and many others were injured. The 8 victims were 14, 16, two were 21, two were 23, and one was 27 years old, and one unknown. At least 25 people were transported to the hospital and of those, 13 remained hospitalized Saturday. The Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner adds, five of them are under 18 years old.

A video from the event showed Scott on an outdoor stage, looking into the crowd in confusion as an ambulance with flashing lights moved into the densely packed crowd.

“Once the show started, all hell broke loose,” says Alexis Guavin, a 23-year-old man that attended the concert. “All of what is to be 50,000 people ran to the front, compressing everyone together with the little air available.”

The crowd surge came hours after someone was injured when people rushed through a VIP entrance to the event in the afternoon. This all took place after two years when three people were trampled and injured at the same festival as many rushed to enter back in 2019.

By Saturday, officials in Houston were at a loss to describe how the concert, which was supposed to be a two-day festival, had transformed in an instant from a enjoyable concert, to a fight for life. Those who had been at the outdoor concert described a thrust of the crowd as Travis Scott came on stage around 9 p.m.

Scott continued to play through his music not worrying about a thing, only pausing briefly to acknowledge that something appeared to be wrong when the ambulance entered the crowd around 9:30 p.m. The live nation team stopped the concert around 30 minutes earlier than they had originally planned. The Houston police chief, Troy Finner, said that officials were worried that cutting off the concert would only make matters worse.

“You cannot just close when you have 50,000 individuals,” he said. “We have to worry about rioting, riots, when you have a group that young.”

Extremely crowded conditions at a concert are not unheard of, and some at the concert said that they did not realize that anyone had been seriously injured or killed until after they got back home.

The most common cause of injury and death in crowds is compressive asphyxia, when people are pushed against one another so tightly that their airways become constricted. This happens most often during a “crowd rush”, when the audience is packed together so tightly that people cannot move, but it can also occur during a stampede.

This event has affected a lot of people in the process. Affecting families and friends of the victims. And even fans of the famous rapper, have been shocked deeply of what their idol has allowed to happen.

“It’s honestly devastating, I really like Travis Scott and his music, and would love to go to one of his concerts, but its really scary. A lot of people were trying to help the injured people, and get them to safety, along with all the ambulances and stuff. But from videos I’ve seen, it doesn’t seem like Travis Scott did anything to help. Yeah, I think he noticed that there was something wrong at some point, but he just continued with the show. He didn’t acknowledge anything that was going on.” Says, Rico Gonzales, a sophomore.

What happened at Travis Scott’s Astroworld festival is a terrible sick tragedy. It is very sad that nothing was done from Travis, and he continued to ignore the people. It’s very upsetting that he let a lot of people get injured, and let 8 people die, some of which were very young. And as this seems to be a reoccurring thing at Travis Scotts events, there should be something done to prevent it.