TRAGIC ACCIDENT AT ROSKILDE FESTIVAL IN DENMARK:
Late on Friday night 8 people, all male, lost their lives during a concert on Roskilde Festival's main stage.
Furthermore 1 person (male) is badly injured.
According to the information so far the accident is due to a number of people in the crowd in front of the stage lost their balance, and the accident occurred.
All disposable rescue personnel were drawn to the front of the stage, and the injured people were immediately brought to Roskilde Hospital.
Technical investigations are presently taking place. The festival is expected to continue after an evaluation of how the event can continue despite of the accident and with the deepest respect for the perished.
Identification has not yet taken place. Anxious relatives of guests on Roskilde Festival can contact the nearest police office for information - as guests on the festival are encouraged to get in touch with relatives in order to inform of their being. On the festival site emergency relief is available.
Everybody on the festival are deeply concerned with the accident and wish to express their sympathy with relatives.
From the Associated Press:
8 Dead in Denmark Pearl Jam Concert
By JAN M. OLSEN
.c The Associated Press
COPENHAGEN, Denmark (June 30) - Fans rushed the stage during a Pearl Jam concert at a Danish rock
festival late Friday, crushing to death at least eight people and injuring three others, police said.
Members of the rock band appealed to the crowd to move back, but were unable to prevent the massive surge forward, Danish radio reported.
''Several people were crushed or trampled to death,'' police said in a statement. The rush occurred at 11:40 p.m., police said, adding that the identities of the victims were not immediately available.
After the stampede, the performance at the Roskilde festival's main stage was halted, the radio said. The stage was one of seven stages hosting performances during the four-day event, Europe's largest. About 100,000 tickets were sold, but it was not immediately clear how many people attended the concert.
It rained much of Friday, and the festival grounds were muddy. With the crowd edging ever closer, the band called on fans to move back, festival spokesman Leif Skov said. The message was repeated by loudspeakers.
Pearl Jam broke off its performance and the next show by the British band The Cure was canceled in ''respect for the dead,'' Skov said. The deaths were announced over loudspeakers and some concert goers began crying, Danish radio reported.
Performances at the six other stages continued Saturday night, and were scheduled to resume on the main stage Saturday afternoon.
The Roskilde festival, first held in 1971, was inspired by the 1969 Woodstock Festival in the United States. It is held annually on a farm in Roskilde, 25 miles west of the capital, Copenhagen.
It was one of Europe's worst concert tragedies. Last year, 52 people were killed and 150 injured at a concert at Minsk, Belarus, when a hailstorm hit and hundreds of fans rushed for a nearby subway station, an exodus that quickly became a deadly stampede.
In 1979, 11 people were trampled to death in Cincinnati as they rushed for choice seats before the start of a concert by the British rock band The Who.
AP-NY-06-30-00 2303EDT
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