Thank you so much for joining us for our
special web coverage at 5:00 o'clock.
I'm Cheryl Mercedes. Let's take a
live look from air 11 over NRG Park.
This is the aftermath of the deadly night
day two of the concert was cancelled
and crews started taking things down.
Earlier today we've got our crews spread
out across the city at every angle,
covering the story.
Let's start out with our Matt Doherty Matt.
We just got an update from police
and still many questions.
Yeah, within the last hour,
Cheryl local officials were able to
give us a few more details about
their preliminary investigation.
However, you're right,
we still have a lot more questions.
First, I want to tell you about
the ages of some of the victims.
One was 14-1 was 16,
two were 21, and two were 23,
one was 27 and the age of the last
person remains unknown at this time.
In total, there were eight people who died.
13 people are still hospitalized,
five of them are.
Miners were told a 10 year
old is still in the hospital
tonight in critical condition.
Now one of the most shocking details
we learned today is that Houston
police are investigating an incident
where a security officer may have
been stuck in the neck with a syringe.
The officer was administered Narcan,
which is given to revive someone
who's had an opiate overdose.
The chief explained the incident
to reporters today.
We do have a report of a security officer
according to the medical staff that
was out and treated him last night.
That he was reaching over to
restrain or grab a citizen,
and he felt a prick in his neck.
When he was examined, he went unconscious.
They administer Narcan.
He was revived.
And the medical staff did notice
a prick that was similar to
a prick that you would get if
somebody's trying to inject.
Now, Fire Department Chief Samuel Pena
says that several doses of Narcan were
administered at the event. Last night.
However, he did not have a number on
exactly how many Chief Fenner says.
Several of the individuals were trampled.
Chief Pena says there were several
permits filed for the event.
However, he says there is no occupancy
limit for outdoor events like this.
One's police chief inner says at one point,
there were 528 police officers and 755
security officers at last night's event.
Of course there are still a whole
lot of unanswered questions tonight.
We hope to bring you more answers
as this investigation continues.
Cheryl back
to you Matt, and as the chief
reiterated many times,
this is an active investigation and
they will leave nothing unturned.
Thank you so much.
Matt Doherty reporting live.
Travis Scott released a statement
earlier today saying in part
quote I'm absolutely devastated
by what took place last night.
My prayers go out to the families
and all of those impacted.
Houston PD has my total support.
You can read his full statement on
khou.com and we are learning now
about the first confirmed victim
who died in the Chaos Spring Branch
ISD sent a letter to parents
saying the victim was a 9th grade
student at Memorial High School.
Our team is working to learn more
about the student and we will bring you
the latest information as soon as we get it.
An estimated 50,000 people
were packed into that.
Parking lot at NRG.
A festival attendee says the
massive crowd is why there was
so much chaos and confusion.
Melissa Correa joins us now
with more from his perspective.
Melissa. Hey there Cheryl.
Astro World Festival was Reese
Blue's first music festival.
You see him standing there
in the orange sweatshirt.
He's 6/2 and says his size is why
he was able to work his way closer
to the stage as the night went on.
This is his cell phone video.
You can see Reese is not far from the stage.
But look at how many people
are crammed in between.
Listen as he describes
the crowd of thousands,
essentially becoming like water
when Travis Scott took the stage.
It literally the the crowd becomes a fluid.
Essentially you you get you get pushed
from the back because people keep pressing
in and then the people at the gates.
They don't know where to go.
They push back and so you're
just kind of like floating.
It's almost like a wave,
but an uncontrolled wave.
You're not actually standing on the ground,
you're just standing on other people's shoes.
Sardines. Reese says people were
so crammed in that you could not
push back even if you wanted to,
says the crowd became even more chaotic
when Drake joined Travis Scott on stage
for a performance said people were
screaming for the concert to stop.
I mean, I'm around people and
they're yelling. Stop the show,
chat people were shading help stop the
show and that's what I was like dude.
And then he stopped for a
second and he said what and
then he looked over on one side.
He told them like hey get her off,
get her up.
Videos on social media
show what happened next.
The concert continued until it
became more evident that hundreds
of people were in physical danger.
Some of those viral videos even
show first responders Cheryl
struggling to reach some of
the people who were affected,
packed in, and struggling to find
a place to go to find safety.
Hard to believe. Thank you so much.
Melissa Correa, reporting a
reunification center was set up at
the Wyndham Wingate Hotel on Kirby
near the 6:10 Loop to help families.
Reunite with their loved ones.
That's where we find our
Brittany Ford and Brittany.
You've seen a lot happening there today.
Imagine a lot of loved ones
going there to see if they can
find their family members.
Rochelle. We've seen dozens of people
here at the reunification center just
looking for answers and trying to
reconnect with their family members.
We have the video to show you
what things look like here.
Throughout the day,
we've seen constant concert goers still
in their clothes from last night,
speaking with officers and
personnel from the Houston Emergency
Management Center that have been
on site here throughout the day.
The agency also had a hotline number.
They were directing families to
call for information if they didn't
or hadn't heard from a loved one
that went to the concert.
Last night, but really,
as you mentioned,
it's been emotional out here.
We've seen families again hugging each other,
consoling each other.
Back out here live the good news here
is that our last update from Judge
Lina Hidalgo says that everyone here
at the concert or everyone at the
concert last night has been accounted for.
The next steps here really will
be what happened to those people
and those families that have loved
ones that were hurt.
I'll send it back to you all
right? Thank you so much.
That was Brittany Ford reporting
not long ago, governor.
Abbott, saying what has happened at
Astral Festival last night was tragic
and our hearts are with those who lost
their lives and those who are injured.
There are growing memorials outside
the Astro World Festival venue,
where many concert goers are
returning now to pay respects
to those killed and injured.
That's where we find our
Jason Miles and Jason.
I imagine a very emotional scene right now.
Oh, to say the least, you know a lot
of the people coming here today had
tickets to day two of the festival,
returning in a much more somber mood.
As you might imagine, this is one
of a couple of makeshift memorials
here along the West Ridge near Kirby,
the venue of Astro World Festival.
Notes include RIP to all of the ragers
and people from various cities have
written their condolences as well.
We've seen a number of people come
by in just the short time we've
been out here this afternoon,
some bringing bouquets of flowers.
All have stories about last
night and 18 year old.
We met from Toronto, Canada.
A huge Travis Scott fan said he
had a blast until the crowd started
getting a little too chaotic.
That's when he heard and saw
things he'll never forget.
I understand people are there to rage,
but sometimes it gets too far.
You know, like I saw people
getting thrown around,
I saw people getting hurt in there.
It was horrible like I was.
I was a little scared at times.
You know, like this is my first concert too.
This was a really strange experience
for me to tell you the truth,
this was really strange.
His very first concert now this is video.
Another concert goer shared
with us this afternoon.
You can see he couldn't even keep
his phone steady because of all
of the movement that I'm told only
got worse as Drake took the stage.
Much to the surprise of many
of the folks at the festival.
Now back out here.
Live as a fellow just came
up with this shirt,
hung it on the fence next to the
balloons and the cards here again.
A tribute to the folks who
lost their lives here.
Many others who were injured and
people continue to make their way.
Along this stretch of West Ridge,
a place where so many people entered
the festival yesterday and left in
many cases in horror back to you
still so hard to believe.
Thank you so much Jason Miles reporting
live KHR you 11 Investigates has spent
the day digging into the question was
enough done to keep concert goers safe?
Jeremy Rogalski spoke with a national
crowd safety expert for some insight
Jeremy Cheryl.
That expert has studied crowd
management for 30 years and he says.
The problem all begins with the
layout of the concert itself.
The festival style standing room only set up,
he says, is by far the most dangerous.
From Elvis Presley on everybody is known.
This is problematic.
The dangers of festival concert
configurations are well documented,
says crowd safety expert Paul Wertheimer.
It forces people in the crowd
to work against each other.
This is the worst thing that
can happen in crowd safety.
The layout, he says,
requires special precautions
to reduce crowd density and
clear pathways for first
responders to treat the injured.
All of this should be spelled
out in the promoters.
Special event permit application
which requires a security control
plan and emergency medical plan
and who approved the risk assessment.
The crowd management plan and the
emergency plan and who prepared those.
I want to see that and then you're going
to find out where everything went wrong.
City and county leaders say
they are reviewing what
promoter Live Nation submitted.
Perhaps the plans were inadequate.
Perhaps the plans were good,
but they weren't followed.
Officials say there were more than 500.
Houston police officers in and
around Energy Park and another 755
private security guards on scene.
As for medical care. Live Nation
hired a third party to be on site
for a non event.
It would have been enough
but the crowd crushing event
quickly spun out of control.
It required 62 Houston Fire
Department units to respond to take
25 concert goers to the hospital.
And Fire Chief Sam Pena says inspectors
were out earlier this week at NRG
and last night he says there were no
reports of any exit doors blocked,
but the problem was so many concertgoers
couldn't get to those exits because they
were so tightly packed near the stage.
Cheryl, all right,
good information there.
Thank you so much, Jeremy again.
There are several phone numbers set
up for families who haven't heard
from Astro World Festival attendees.
Those numbers are right there on your screen.
Eight through 8323.
Line 329 ninety one or
832-393-2990. Officials say you
can also just simply dial 311 or
7138370311. We have all these numbers
for you right now online at khou.com.
There are thousands of posts lying all
over social media about what happened
at the Travis Scott concert at Astro
World and a lot of misinformation.
Is already spreading online.
Brandy Smith is here to break down.
What we do know.
First I want to say we only know
what first responders have confirmed.
I don't wanna downplay what happened,
but I do wanna add a little context.
As someone who was there,
I think most people, like myself,
had no idea people were in trouble.
But it is clear from video
shared on social media some of
the crowd did and tried to help.
Texas A&M student Sienna is seen
in multiple videos crawling onto a
production platform yelling at the crew
about what she's seen in the crowd.
In another video,
the crowd appears to chant, stop the show.
Just playing slowly.
Scott did pause his performance,
which was being streamed on Apple Music.
Somebody passed out right here, hold on,
don't touch him, don't touch him,
everybody just back up to point
out someone who needed help.
Quick keep going.
The show went on even as first
responders drove into the crowd.
At that point, social media documented
people climbing on those vehicles.
There are more videos out there
showing people lying on the ground,
some getting CPR, unconscious,
people being crowd served.
We are not showing those because we
either can't confirm their legitimacy
or because they are too graphic
back to you. Thank you so much.
Brandy posts by a Houston ICU nurse are
also gaining traction on social media,
she told our Melissa Correa that
she stepped in because security
guards were overwhelmed. That's
right, Cheryl.
Madeline Eskins snapped this photo
Friday afternoon as she entered NRG Park.
The ICU nurse took a day off from
work and had every intention of
having fun with her boyfriend,
but the medical worker and her
boyfriend ran into trouble last night.
She says they were near the front of the
stage as Travis Scott was performing.
Air 11 shows us what a crowd
of 50,000 people looks like.
Madeline says it felt like she
was quote drowning in people.
She says she was so crammed in she
literally could not raise her arms
or lower them if she wanted to.
She was feeling pressure from
every direction.
At one point she says she passed
out so her boyfriend and a security
guard carried her out of the crowd.
And when she came to,
Madeline says she was among several
other people who were in medical trouble.
Notice of one guy that they were carrying.
He looked real bad and I stopped and I said,
have you checked the polls?
And the security guard was like I don't
know how I said OK. I mean,
I see you nurse, you know,
let me help. He's like yeah
please check the pulse whatever
and you know the post and I said
hey don't put him down to go get
someone else you need to take him
straight to the medical tent and
then none other security guard
overheard me say I was an ICU nurse
so he said hey like I said what can
I do to help you sit down please?
We need help over here.
Madeline says she triaged people
for several minutes and stayed
in the parking lot there at NRG,
until every person she helped was
taken to a hospital via ambulance.
She and her boyfriend say
they're physically OK today,
but so many people,
especially those whose posts
have gone viral on social media,
are telling me that they are
still in shock and they are too
exhausted to begin processing
last night's traumatic experience.
Our heart and our prayers go out to them.
Cheryl,
yeah, Melissa, but that's
going to take a lot of time.
Thank you so much for those of you.
Perhaps just joining us.
This is our special continuing coverage
of the Astro World Festival tragedy.
At least eight people died,
hundreds of others injured
when a huge crowd surged
toward the stage during the Travis
Scott performance last night.
The festival was one of the most
anticipated musical events of the year,
up to 50,000 people were in attendance
as aerial footage from our chopper shows,
fans started arriving early.
12:13 PM Air 11 captures some of
the first arrivals to the festival.
Organizers opening the
gates to allow fans inside.
Even though the show didn't
officially kick off until 1:00 PM.
By three o'clock a nice
sized crowd had gathered.
The space started to fill up,
but it hadn't reached capacity just yet.
2 hours later, the venue was even Fuller.
The crowd all pushed toward the stage,
even though there appears to be
available space towards the back.
708 it's a similar situation.
You can see the space is not full,
but most of the people are
concentrated towards the stage.
This is about 2 hours before
things went horribly wrong.
And here's how it looked just
before 1:00 this morning,
the scene had cleared,
except for the first responders
who had come to the aid of hundreds
of victims who had succumbed to
the devastating crowd surge.
Will be following the tragedy and
asked her world for quite some time.
Our live team coverage will
continue on Kaiju 11 news at 6
and 10 as well as kaiju.com.
We also want to remind you of several
phone numbers available for those
who haven't heard from a loved
one who attended that festival.
Those numbers are
832-393-2991 or
832-393-2990. Officials said
you can also dial 311 or
71383703. On one you can also
find those numbers on khu.com.
We'll see you right back here at 6 and 10.