Seoul stampede and the world's worst crowd disasters

Halloween celebrations went terribly wrong in the trendy, nightlife neighbourhood of Itaewon in Seoul. Tens of thousands of people flooded the narrow streets of Itaewon to party on Saturday (October 29), and as the crowds started to swell, people could not move freely and started to panic.

What exactly caused the crush still isn’t clear, but witnesses say that the Halloween partygoers had been packed tightly in the district’s narrow streets and soon this led to a stampede.

As of Sunday afternoon, 151 people have been killed and 82 injured in this Seoul stampede – making it one of the country’s worst disasters. Nineteen foreign nationals, from Iran, Norway, China, Australia and Uzbekistan, are also among the dead.

According to news reports, authorities first received reports of people being “buried” in crowds at around 10.24 pm local time on Saturday night. The police and firemen rushed to the spot and were seen trying to revive people suffering from a cardiac arrest amid all the chaos in the narrow streets. Many young people lost their lives in this Halloween disaster, which is considered to be among the most deadly such tragedies to have occurred across the world in recent years.

Indonesia’s football stadium tragedy; other football disasters

This massive tragedy comes on the heels of the death of 131 people earlier this month on October 1 in a stampede after a heated soccer match between two of Indonesia’s biggest teams at the Kanjuruhan Stadium in east Java.

The match had ended with Arema losing 3-2 to Persebaya Surabaya and this raised tempers among the fans, as it was the first time Arema had lost to their rivals at home in 23 years. Hundreds of fans stormed the pitch, some angry, others to meet the players. To control the crowd, the police resorted to using tear gas to quell the “riots” as they viewed it.

Also read: World leaders express sadness after Seoul stampede kills 151

Once the police used the tear gas, the crowds started running to the exits and this led to a crush in one of the narrow gates. The stadium had been filled to overcapacity on that day and many victims were trampled or choked to death. The doors were either not open or not wide enough for people to exit, said news reports.

Arema football coach Javier Roca told the media that fans “died in the arms of players”, after some team members stayed on the pitch when the game ended. At least six people, including three police officers, have been charged for using tear gas leading to the deadly incident.

The tragedy in Indonesia is recognised as one of the world’s worst stadium disasters. This seems similar to the 1989 Hillsborough Stadium disaster in Sheffield, England, in which more than 90 people were crushed to death, and 900 injured. Labelled as Britain’s worst sports disaster, a crowd surge crushed fans against barriers at a semi-final match between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest.

The Indonesia stampede also resembles one of Africa’s worst soccer disasters, when 126 people were killed at a stadium in Ghana in May 2001, after police fired tear gas at rioting fans.

Here are some of the other worst stampedes that stunned the world:

Mata Vaishno Devi disaster in J&K

the year 2022 kickstarted with a tragedy in India when at least a dozen pilgrims died and 15 others were injured, after a stampede occurred at the Mata Vaishno Devi shrine in Jammu and Kashmir’s Reasi district. It happened around 2.45 am on New Year’s day, when a large number of devotees had queued up for a ‘darshan’ of the sanctum sanctorum situated inside the cave shrine on Trikuta hills in Katra.

A minor altercation between some young boys in that heavy rush purportedly triggered the stampede. Mata Vaishno Devi temple is situated on a hilltop in Katra town of Jammu that attracts millions of devotees from across the world every year.

Also watch: 151 killed in Halloween stampede in South Korea

2021

The Travis Scott concert tragedy

Music concerts are potentially dangerous venues and can easily spur stampedes. Ten people died, which included a 9-year-old at the infamous Astroworld tragedy at rap star Travis Scott’s concert in Houston, Texas, USA. While the 29-year-old rapper performed on November 5, 2021, the crowd had surged forward towards the stage and caused a mass stampede.

The others who died were in the age group of 14 years to 27 years. Some 300 people were injured and treated at the festival site.

Crush at religious festival in Israel

Tens of thousands of ultra-Orthodox Jews had thronged to the Galilee tomb of 2nd-century sage Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai for the annual Lag B’Omer commemorations that include all-night prayer, mystical songs and dance on April 2021.

Medics said there had been a stampede in the men’s section of the gender-segregated festival. At least 45 people were crushed to death in a packed passageway, asphyxiated or trampled upon, in this overcrowded religious bonfire festival. Prime Minister Benjamin called the crush one of the “heaviest disasters” in Israeli history and declared a day of mourning. He promised a thorough investigation to ensure it did not happen again.

2015

Haj pilgrimage crush

A horrific stampede killed at least 717 pilgrims on the outskirts of the holy city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia on September 2015. It was considered to be the deadliest tragedy to strike the annual hajj pilgrimage in more than 25 years.

Many victims were crushed and trampled to death, while they were on their way to perform the symbolic stoning of the devil by throwing pebbles against three stone columns in Mina. It is a large valley about five kilometres from Mecca and has been the site of hajj stampedes in past years.

Also read: Indonesia stampede: Major football disasters of the past century

The disaster began when one wave of pilgrims headed headlong into a mass of people going in the opposite direction. The hajj poses a huge logistical and security challenge for Saudi Arabia, considering hundreds of thousands of people from around the world visit the site.

The death toll exceeded that of a similar incident in 2006, near the same site, when more than 360 pilgrims were killed in a stampede. Another stampede at Mina in 2004 left 244 pilgrims dead and hundreds injured.

The deadliest tragedy in Hajj happened in 1990, when at least nearly 1,426 pilgrims died in a stampede inside an overcrowded pedestrian tunnel, the al-Muaissem in Mecca.

2013

Nightclub stampede in Brazil

More than 230 people died after a fire broke out at a nightclub in the southern Brazilian college town of Santa Maria in January 2013. The stampede crushed some victims and prevented others from fleeing the fumes and flames.

2010 and 2009

Cambodia’s water festival turns grim

In Cambodia’s capital Phnom Penh, mass panic on the last day of a water festival in 2010 triggered panic. At least 350 people were killed during the crush, which took place on bridge near the Royal Palace in November 2010.

2008

Stampedes at temples in India

Rumours of a landslide led to a stampede, after pilgrims panicked at the Naina Devi temple in Himachal Pradesh state in India in August 2008. At least 145 people died, including 30 children, and more than 100 was injured. Tens of thousands of pilgrims had converged on the remote temple, about 90 miles from the state capital of Shimla, to celebrate Shravan Navratras, a nine-day festival that honours the Hindu goddess Shakti, or divine mother.

Stampedes at temples have occurred many times before at Indian religious festivals, when thousands of people gather to pray, and safety precautions are minimal.

Next month, in September, 147 people are killed in a stampede at the Chamunda temple, near the historic western town of Jodhpur.

2005

The Iraq tragedy

n August, at least 1,005 people died in Iraq when Shi’ites got frightened and created a stampede near a bridge over the Tigris river in Baghdad. They panicked after hearing rumours of a suicide bomber in the crowd.

While the same year, in January, at least 265 Hindu pilgrims are killed in a crush near a remote temple in India’s Maharashtra state.