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Seoul: At least 146 killed in crowd crush during Halloween festivities

theguardian.com

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Re: Seoul: At least 146 killed in crowd crush during Halloween festivities

#21

Post by scaramanga »

Mountain_Skies wrote: post #6
yummypaint wrote: post #4

Crushes like this are especially hearbreaking because they are the result of people at the back of the crowd not knowing those at the front are being asphyxiated. We should teach more about this phenomenon in schools and have a universally understood protocol so crowds can alert themselves to a crush. We could have a code-word or gesture that can be spread quickly person to person and is understood to mean "everyone…

In a monocultural society like South Korea, it's a good idea that probably could work very well and would have saved lives. I'm afraid here in the west it would quickly be abused by morons wanting to amuse themselves at gatherings and quickly be ignored, making it useless.

I can assure you that crowds in Itaewon are not not monocultural (although on Halloween it is a bit, because it's one of the rare occasions Koreans will go there in large numbers). I can also confirm that South Korea does indeed, have plenty of morons.

But perhaps I'm missing the point and this is the sub-thread for racist tropes/talking points. Why can't all minorities be more like Asians?

Re: Seoul: At least 146 killed in crowd crush during Halloween festivities

#22

Post by scaramanga »

throwaway894345 wrote: post #9
yummypaint wrote: post #4

Crushes like this are especially hearbreaking because they are the result of people at the back of the crowd not knowing those at the front are being asphyxiated. We should teach more about this phenomenon in schools and have a universally understood protocol so crowds can alert themselves to a crush. We could have a code-word or gesture that can be spread quickly person to person and is understood to mean "everyone…

This is probably not the right reaction (and may well be unpopular), but it makes me angry. I know no one is trying to kill anyone, but it feels like people disregarding others' safety just to get a little bit closer to some amusement. Ideally people would just relax and accept that there isn't room for them nearer the stage/etc. > everyone turn around, people are being killed I wonder if this would worsen the danger…

These events tend to happen because people are escaping a crush in both directions.

I'm sure everyone in the crowd was aware that it was getting dangerous. And everyone just tried to get out and encountered other people facing the same issue, coming the other way.

The cause is lack of proper crowd management because if you view the cause as just "humans are fundamentally flawed", then you are basically just accepting the deaths because we're not going to fix humans...

In other words, just think it through? Nobody is endangering their own life to get closer to an amusement. Well, maybe in some other sense, like standing closer to a dangerous firework before it goes off or something. But not in the sense of being extremely uncomfortable and feeling rising panic, and then moving forward towards to get some more uncomfortable panic feeling because, welp, gotta get to the bar. Packed crowds are extremely distressing long before you get asphyxiated in them.

Re: Seoul: At least 146 killed in crowd crush during Halloween festivities

#23

Post by scaramanga »

Eleison23 wrote: post #12

I was a victim of crowd crush one summer at an open-air Cure concert. Dinosaur JR was opening, and I was eager to get up-close. I was kind of rattled by frat boys actually bellowing, "kill the weak!" but when the music started I was caught up and crushed up against the stage. Thankfully there were vigilant security guards to pull me to safety.

Glad you're still with us.

Re: Seoul: At least 146 killed in crowd crush during Halloween festivities

#25

Post by lakomen »

I watched Papesan, a Twitch streamer who was live there, but switched to another channel, saw he had over 8k viewers and then suddenly he was gone.

An hour later I read in chat that there was a stampede in Seoul at the Halloween gathering. Pape removed the recorded video and clips, but apparently the clips and vod are mirrored somewhere.

There a tragic thing happening, you're on a live streaming platform and no you can't show what happened because that would be a bannable offense, the world is fucked up.

Re: Seoul: At least 146 killed in crowd crush during Halloween festivities

#26

Post by SturgeonsLaw »

scaramanga wrote: post #21
Mountain_Skies wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a monocultural society like South Korea, it's a good idea that probably could work very well and would have saved lives. I'm afraid here in the west it would quickly be abused by morons wanting to amuse themselves at gatherings and quickly be ignored, making it useless.

I can assure you that crowds in Itaewon are not not monocultural (although on Halloween it is a bit, because it's one of the rare occasions Koreans will go there in large numbers). I can also confirm that South Korea does indeed, have plenty of morons. But perhaps I'm missing the point and this is the sub-thread for racist tropes/talking points. Why can't all minorities be more like Asians?

Parent comment is an internet classic, when there's only a surface level, stereotypical understanding of a foreign culture, and the assumption that's all there is to it.

Bonus points when the perceived population homogeneity is used as a reason why universal healthcare works "over there" but couldn't possibly work here. It's ignorant and racist as soon as it's given even a cursory examination.

Re: Seoul: At least 146 killed in crowd crush during Halloween festivities

#27

Post by londons_explore »

throwaway894345 wrote: post #9
yummypaint wrote: post #4

Crushes like this are especially hearbreaking because they are the result of people at the back of the crowd not knowing those at the front are being asphyxiated. We should teach more about this phenomenon in schools and have a universally understood protocol so crowds can alert themselves to a crush. We could have a code-word or gesture that can be spread quickly person to person and is understood to mean "everyone…

This is probably not the right reaction (and may well be unpopular), but it makes me angry. I know no one is trying to kill anyone, but it feels like people disregarding others' safety just to get a little bit closer to some amusement. Ideally people would just relax and accept that there isn't room for them nearer the stage/etc. > everyone turn around, people are being killed I wonder if this would worsen the danger…

You imagine people pushing others hard. But the reality is crushing can also be caused by thousands of people pushing gently. For example if there is a line of 1000 people, with person to person contact, and there is something nice in one direction (eg. The exit to a concert), or nasty in the other direction (encroaching fire or flood), then merely pushing with 1 lb of force means by the end of the line you have 1000 lbs of force, which would crush anyone.

The effect is made worse in 2 dimensions because of converging field lines having a force amplification effect.

Re: Seoul: At least 146 killed in crowd crush during Halloween festivities

#28

Post by londons_explore »

Symbiote wrote: post #14
willio58 wrote: post #10

I’ve been to a couple music festivals this year and I experienced the crowd at one of the main stages compressing. One thing that’s not talked about as much is the heat caused by surges. If you’re shorter, I could easily see getting cooked alive compressed by bodies unable to gasp for fresh air. I’m much taller than most which helps with getting air but I was shocked to experience how hard it was to get out of the cr…

Where? Music festivals in Europe (at least 5 countries in familiar with) build barricades to prevent surges at festivals. This shows there's a barricade part way back from the main stage at Roskilde Festival in Denmark: https://www.etnow.com/news/2016/3/mojo-barriers-secures-thre...

To be precise, these are fences which are too big to push over by oneself, but will move when pushed on by hundreds of people. That relieves any crowd pressure, and the movement of the baraccade is a signal to organisers that they have screwed up and need to prevent more people entering that area.

Re: Seoul: At least 146 killed in crowd crush during Halloween festivities

#29

Post by londons_explore »

Crowd crushes always happen at high profile events with a lot of media presence, happen to hundreds at once, and are particularly reported on because the victims usually did nothing wrong.

But where do they fall amongst all other causes of mortality? Are they in the top 100 causes of death? Top 1000? Do the crowd crushes of street festivals make it an activity as risky as say mountain climbing per hour that you're taking part?

Re: Seoul: At least 146 killed in crowd crush during Halloween festivities

#30

Post by sjadoinqwoeihad »

yummypaint wrote: post #4

Crushes like this are especially hearbreaking because they are the result of people at the back of the crowd not knowing those at the front are being asphyxiated. We should teach more about this phenomenon in schools and have a universally understood protocol so crowds can alert themselves to a crush. We could have a code-word or gesture that can be spread quickly person to person and is understood to mean "everyone…

Yes 100%. This reminds me of bees or fireflies. They have algorithms that individuals follow which can cause the collective to behave in a certain way. We should definitely create something like that.

You can't rely on spoken signals, mainly because of other noise and broken phone effect. Something like raising your hands and crossing them could work. People who are close to the crush will quickly agree and raise their hands, so it's unlikely that one troll could make a false alarm since you would need maybe ~30 or so people to get the signal started. This signal could propagate through a huge crowd in just a minute or two.

Initially I thought about drones with arrows and loudspeakers but it seems a bit too niche of a usecase to have a swarm of drones for. Also doesn't quite work in all conditions.

I had a lot of mini crush experiences in primary school. Students holding doors for fun and everyone trying to push through. People jumping on top of each other and making human piles. I think these are all good experiences to understand how crowds work, even at small scales. I think schools could teach this kind of protocol and practice it. It's also important that this doesn't cause a mass panic and a stampede so drills are necessary.

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