At least eight people died and many were injured following an apparent crowd surge during Mr. Scott’s headlining set at the Astroworld Festival, making it one of the deadliest concert disasters in years. Authorities have launched an investigation into the surge, security measures and reports that someone was injecting fans with drugs. It remains unclear how either potential safety lapses or criminal activity might have been connected to the crowd surge.
Much as they did after other recent tragedies—including the mass shooting at Route 91 Harvest Festival in 2017 which left 58 dead—music executives and concert-safety experts are debating the appropriate level of safety at festivals, which have been a financial bright spot for the concert business in recent years.
Questions being asked include whether the Houston festival should have been designed differently to mitigate risks associated with a packed crowd, and whether security staff were adequately prepared, especially given Mr. Scott’s record of raucous shows. Executives and security experts are also debating whether Mr. Scott and his team should have moved faster to end the show.
Most say it is too early to assign blame given the host of factors involved and a dearth of knowledge about what sparked the reported crowd surge. A spokeswoman for Live Nation Entertainment, which owns the festival’s promoter, couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.
“The bottom line is no one should be getting crushed at music festivals,” said Mike Luba, senior vice president of global touring at AEG Presents, the world’s No. 2 concert promoter after Live Nation Entertainment. “If it happens, something went wrong somewhere in a pretty fundamental way.”
Michael Downing, security chief for Prevent Advisors, a security-consulting arm of live-entertainment company Oak View Group, said that barriers or pens could have been erected to segment Mr. Scott’s fans into groups, facilitating the entry and exit of security staff in the event of medical emergencies or threats like an active shooter.
Another music-industry security consultant said past major festivals have on occasion split the crowd into six or eight sections, divided by barriers. By contrast, Mr. Scott’s fans were packed tight near the front in a large mass. “If there is anything to Monday-morning quarterback, it’d be the design of the festival, given these kids crush up against the stage,” the consultant said.
In the case of Mr. Scott, a genre-blurring musical heir to Kanye West who is known for his chaotic shows, there were red flags; past concerts have been marred by reckless behavior, including fans climbing from a balcony to the ground floor at one venue. “There is definitely going to be [thinking about] how you look at controlling crowd crushes,” the consultant said.
During a press conference on Saturday, Houston officials defended the security at the event, saying the police department had 528 police officers and that Live Nation had 755 private security officers there.
In a video posted on Instagram on Saturday night, Mr. Scott said he could never have imagined anything like this happening. “Any time I can make out anything that’s going on, I stop the show,” he said. A spokeswoman for Mr. Scott said he had no further comment.
Timothy Epstein, who runs the entertainment and sports practice at law firm Duggan Bertsch and represents promoters of festivals including Pitchfork, Riot Fest and Life Is Beautiful, said Astroworld Festival didn’t have a glaring security deficit and that if lack of security were a chronic problem in the industry, such disasters wouldn’t be so rare.
Mr. Epstein played down suggestions that Mr. Scott’s decision to perform unopposed—no other acts were playing during his set—played a role. However, he said, it was possible the sheer number of concertgoers requiring help simultaneously overwhelmed security. “The more people that have issues or go down or become in need of help, the more strain it puts on any type of security system,” he said.
Another potential factor: There were hundreds of security personnel present, but they weren’t trained well enough, several executives and experts say.
The concert business is grappling with a shortage of seasoned workers including truck drivers, merchandise sellers and rigging specialists. Experts and touring professionals fear this shortage could lead to more safety problems.
Earlier in the day on Friday, video footage showed gate-crashing fans pouring through a V.I.P. security gate, streaming past security personnel. “There probably wasn’t sufficient training,” said Mr. Downing. “You need more than somebody with a security shirt and a radio…You need someone who is trained in crowd-management.”
Then there is the issue of whether Friday’s night show at NRG Park should have ended much earlier. Videos posted to social media show a chaotic scene unfolding in the tightly-packed venue. Some concertgoers can be heard yelling for help as the music continues. At least two people approached a cameraperson and attempted to stop the concert, the videos show. Other videos show what appear to be unconscious concertgoers on the ground, with other attendees attempting to resuscitate them.
Authorities have said that stopping the show immediately ran the risk of sparking a worse calamity. And some industry experts agree that an abbreviated set by Mr. Scott—instead of an abrupt stop—may have been an appropriate course of action. “I’d do the same thing,” said the consultant.
Yet Mr. Downing said something in between—not stopping the show abruptly but better communication with the audience about the issues would have been better. Had concertgoers not been packed in one mass in front of the stage, there would be less reason to fear the consequences of stopping the show, he said.
More information on the nature of the eight deaths is expected to arrive in the coming days. Meanwhile, Mr. Scott remains scheduled to headline the Day N Vegas festival on Nov. 13—once again as the only major act performing in that time slot.
For concert executives in the days and weeks ahead, perhaps the biggest question is: At what point should you decide that you aren’t doing enough to protect fans at an event?
“I don’t think this is a Travis Scott-specific problem,” AEG Presents’ Mr. Luba said. “This could have happened to anyone.”