19 killed, 400 injured in stampede at German techno music festival
19 killed, 400 injured in stampede at German techno music festival The organiser of the Love Parade has said that the Annual German techno music festival will never be held again after a fatal stampede in an entrance tunnel.
The death toll rose to 19 yesterday and police said that 342 had been injured in a panicked crush of partygoers in an overcrowded tunnel that served as the sole entrance to a German festival billed as the world's largest techno music party.
Tunnel to hell: German media reported that at least 1.4 million people
were funnelled through this single tunnel to enter the Love Parade. Pic/AFP"The Love Parade was always a peaceful event and a happy party" but will forever be overshadowed by the tragedy, said Rainer Schaller, organiser of the Love Parade. "It's over for the Love Parade."
Authorities faced tough questions over why hundreds of thousands of people were funneled through a single highway underpass.
German media reported that there were at least 1.4 million people there.
Witnesses said officers in Duisburg, a city near Duesseldorf in western Germany, closed the end of the tunnel emptying onto the festival grounds after they become overcrowded around 5 pm. They told revelers over loudspeakers to turn around and walk back in the other direction. But the entrance to the tunnel did not appear to have been closed and people continued piling in, sparking a panic and then a deadly crush. Witnesses described a desperate scene, as people piled up on each other or scrambled over others who had fallen.
Partygoer Udo Sandhoefer told said that even though no one else was being let in, people still streamed into the tunnel, causing "a real mass panic."
Founder of the Love Parade, Matthias Roeingh, known by the name Dr Motte, blasted the planning for the event, saying "one single entrance through a tunnel lends itself to disaster. I am very sad."
| Origins |
| The first Love Parade was held four months before the opening of the Berlin Wall in 1989. It was started by the Berlin Underground under the initiative of Matthias Roeingh aka 'Dr Motte' and his then girlfriend Danielle de Picciotto. It was held as a political demonstration for peace and international understanding through love and Music. |
