Hello everone,
The Tragedy at the point has recevied a lot of media attention
here. This is the first ever death at a gig in Ireland that happened
insided the venue. Some of my friends were at the show. I couldn't
get a ticket. They were also dissapointed as they show was brillant
the sound and visuals were excellent and the crowd sang along to all
the words. They said it was crazy. When they band came on a lot of
people left their seats to go into the standing area which means most
of the 8,500 crowd were packed into the mosh. The crowd was also very
young. A lot of drunken 15 year olds who were probably at their first
concert and thought crowd surfing and moshing is cool. Its not! I was
at Feile in Cork in August '95 and I got a few doc martens in the
back of the head. A punch in the nuts and they don't come near you
again. The crush during the Stone Roses was mad aswell.
How could it have been adverted? Well SP have drastically
underestimated their popularity in Ireland. They have better chart
sucess than in England. An end of year poll of favourite songs done
every year on the Dave Fanning radio show had BWBW number 1 ahead of
even U2, Nirvana the Cure etc. So they perhaps should have put on an
extra show or played a bigger venue. The crowd was also very young.
12 year olds even. I wasn't allowed to my first concert until I was
just 17 (prince in Cork '90). Perhaps it's not such a bad idea to
put a 16 age limit on concerts or a height restriction on who can go
up front.
The death reminded me of the Hillsborough disaster in Sheffield
England in april '89. Liverpool FC were playing Nottingham Forest Fc
in the FA cup semi-final. A lot of ticket less fans turned up and the
police designated the larger Liverpool following the end with less
capacity. Fans were allowed in and a crush began. Police refused to
listen to fans pleas to open gates and let the overflow out. 96
people died. They were crushed to death. A result of which all top
teams must have all seating stadia. Maybe concerts will go the same
way, seats only.
For those asking for an address to send messages of condolences to
the family, there is none. However a national newspaper the Irish
Times has a web site. It is something like www/irish-times.ie. do a
search using "Irish-Times" to get the exact address. They might send
your messages onto the family, I don't know.
If you ever wondered about the size of the Point check out U2's
Rattle and Hum and Achtung Baby video. in R&H they perform desire
their while recording the lp and while the point is unfinished. And
in AB at the start during the History mix video their is a clip of
God part II from their new years eve show in 89/90 from the point.
The following are newspaper reports from The Irish Independant may
14th 1996 any typos are mine:
GARDAI (irish police) TO INTERVIEW WITNESSES by Don Lavery
Witnesses to the tragic incident at the Point are to be interviewed
by Gardai in an inquiry which is expected to take up to ten days. "We
already have taken statements, some of them on Saturday night, and we
will be interviewing people who were in the area where the incident
happened" , said Superintendent William O'Donoghue of Store Street
who is heading the investigation.
He said Gardai had a lot of names of people who witnessed the
incident while the security staff, concert promoters and management
would also be interviewed.
"The point has excellent procedures in place but we don't know what
went wrong."
"The Garda inquiry will be to what exactly happened and what
recommendation we can make to see it will not happen again," said Mr.
O'Donoghue.
Asked if the Gardai report will be sent to the Directort of Public
Prosecutions he replied: "It depends on what is going to emerge from
the inquiry."
Mr O'Donoghue said the promoter Denis Desmond had called off the
concert after the crowd had been asked several times to move back and
control themselves.
He expected the City Coroner would hold an inquest into the death.
A post mortem examination was carried out yesterday morning and Mr
O'Donoghue said the City Coroner would be given the result and he may
then release it to the Gardai.
Mr O'Donoghue appealed to anyone with any useful information to
contact Store Street Garda Station in Dublin - phone 01-8745415.
FANS TELL OF PANIC SCENES by Alan O'Keeffe
Young concert-goers described yesterday how their Saturday night
outing to the Point turned into a nightmare.
Caoimhe McCann (18) of Dalkey spoke with fellow students at the
institute of Education in Lesson Street of her determination to
escape from danger at the concert.
"fifteen of us were holding hands near the front. It was so crowded
it was hard to stand up. When all the pushing started, I said to may
friends - 'Lets get the hell out of here! No way are we staying
here!'" she said.
"Billy in the band looked really freaked when he told people to go
home. People were booing until they were told a girl was dying.
Everyone then were really upset and started looking for their
friends," she said.
Aiobheann O'Gorman(17) from Rathgar said: "The crowd was swaying
out of control. So many were pushing forward. There was just too
many. We were frantic afterwards looking for friends".
Susie Buckley(17) also from Ballincollig, said their was an area half
way down the concert venue which was lined with barriers. "Some of
the worst crush was behind those barriers" she added.
FAMILY PRIVACY PLEA
The family of tragic teenager Bernadette O'Brien wanted their
privacy respected by the media. Fathe David Herlihy, curate of their
home parish in Shanagarry, said yesterday.
About 20 friends and relatives, including her parents Noel and Anne
Marie and brother Brendan, who had travelled from Cork to Dublin's
Mater Hospital, attended the removal of Bernadette's remains
yesterday afternoon.
MINISTER's WORRY AT DRINK CLAIM
Sports minister Bernard Allen yesterday urged the Point Depot
tragedy inquiry to answer claims that children as young as 14 were at
the concert in a drinking environment writes Dick Cross.
He said it was clear that any investigtion would have to determine
if safety and fire regulations or regulations governing buildings and
crowd control had to be adhered to.
If it was proven that the Point Depot was not in a position to
adequately cope with a crowd of 8,000, then the licence should be
reviewed, the Sports Minister said.
Speaking on RTE's Radio Cork he said he did not wish to anticipate
the findings of any investigation.
Other SP news
They were on Fanning profiled last wednesday and all four gave an
interview in Amsterdam. I taped it of course.
I've been off the list for a while and I was wondering what is the
line song inbetween lines in 1979? you know:
"shakedown 1979"
!?!?
"cool kids never have the time"
etc.
sorry this is so long the news reports took a lot.
could anyone please mail me the May 13th Listessa?
They all blanked out when i tried to copy to a folder.
Thanks
slicer.