HOUSTON — An estimated 50,000 people were packed into that a parking lot at NRG for Astroworld Festival. A festival attendee says the massive crowd is why there was so much chaos and confusion.
Reese Bludau is 6 feet, 2 inches tall and says his size is why he was able to work his way closer to the stage as the night went on.
He wasn’t far from the stage, but there were many people crammed in there. He describes the crowd of thousands, essentially becoming like water when Travis Scott took the stage.
“The crowd becomes a fluid, essentially, you get pushed from the back because people keep pressing in, and then the people at the gates, they don’t have anywhere to go,” he said. “They push back and so you’re just kind of like flowing, almost like a wave, but an uncontrolled wave. You’re not actually standing on the ground, you’re standing on other people’s shoes.”
Like a can of sardines, Reese says people were so crammed in that you could not push back. He says the crowed became even more chaotic when Drake joined Travis Scott on stage.
He said people were screaming for the concert to stop.
“I’m around people, they’re yelling ‘Stop the show,” chanting ‘Help.’ And that’s when I was like, ‘Dude.’ And then he stopped for a second. And he said, ‘What.’ And then he looked over on one side and told them like, ‘Hey get her up. Get her up,’” said Bludau.
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 viral videos even show first responders struggling to reach people.