As incidents rise, does concert safety need another look?
(I give no credibility to any remarks made by Mr. Wertheimer below as they are not backed by any scientific study that could be published in a peer review journal)
Patrick Ryan, USA TODAY 8:06 p.m. EDT August 5, 2014
The good times have gone bad quickly at a number of music shows this summer.
A man had his fingertip bitten off at Beyoncé and Jay Z’s On the Run tour stop in Pasadena, Calif., last Saturday when he accused another concertgoer of groping his girlfriend, becoming the latest victim in a growing list of bizarre and tragic incidents to occur at live music events this summer.
An 18-year-old man was charged with raping a 17-year-old girl in the middle of a crowded lawn at Keith Urban’s July 26 outdoor concert in Mansfield, Mass., while fellow country star Tim McGraw caught flak a week earlier for slapping a fan after she grabbed and ripped his jeans during an Atlanta show.
Last weekend, two people died at Mad Decent Block Party, an EDM event, in Columbia, Md., joining 15 other fatalities at music festivals so far this year — up from seven drug-related fest deaths in 2013, according to Billboard.
Is it coincidence, or is a lack of security and safety regulations to blame?
“We’re talking about summertime, peak concert season, millions of people going to shows — safety is always a paramount concern, but you can’t completely, 100% contain stupid behavior,” says Ray Waddell, Billboard senior editor of touring. “The reason it gets so much media attention when it happens is mostly because it’s so rare. Just like if there’s an accident in a theme park, everybody covers it because it’s rare.”
And despite a promoter’s best efforts to control what goes on inside a venue — whether that means upping security staff, employing drug-sniffing dogs or capping alcohol purchases — it’s impossible to prevent all dangerous behavior, although it can be minimized, says Gary Bongiovanni, editor of Pollstar, which covers the concert industry.
“How is a promoter supposed to stop a drug overdose at an EDM event? Even strip and full-body cavity searches couldn’t stop someone from ingesting drugs just before they come in,” Bongiovanni says. “The negligence would be if the promoter didn’t provide adequate emergency medical on site.”
But promoters and city officials may bear some of the blame for seeking to maximize profits, says Paul Wertheimer, founder of Crowd Management Services, a safety consulting service specializing in live music.
“There’s so much money involved (with these big live events), and cities and communities are so desperate for money,” Wertheimer says. “Promoters know that, artists know that, and they’re cutting corners more than they ever did before,” with minimal security staffing and unlimited alcohol sales.
Electric Daisy Carnival, the Las Vegas EDM mega-fest, brought more than $278 million into Clark County’s economy in 2013, reports the Las Vegas Sun, while Forbes estimated that the three-day Ultra fest may have pumped as much as $200 million into the Miami economy in March.
“It’s becoming acceptable that people are injured or die at these events, it’s not an outrage,” says Wertheimer. “Unless it turns into something substantial, it’s business as usual.”
http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/music/2014/08/05/summer-concert-safety-incidents-deaths/13584929/