Journal of

Transcription

Journal of

Journal of Crowd
Safety and Security Management
An online journal
Vol. 2, No 2, October 2012
Journal of
Crowd Safety and
Security
Management
JCSSM
An online journal
Vol. 2 No 2, October 2012
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Journal of Crowd
An online journal
Editorial Board
Professor Ben Challis, Buckinghamshire New University
Dr Ben Clayton, Buckinghamshire New University
Professor Gil Fried, University of New Haven-USA
Mark Hamilton, G4S Secure Solutions (UK) Ltd
Professor Chris Kemp, Buckinghamshire New University
Professor Patrick Smith, Buckinghamshire New University
Dr Mick Upton, The International Centre for Crowd Management and Security Studies
Dr Eugenia Wickens, Buckinghamshire New University
Phil Wood, MBE, Buckinghamshire New University
Published Volumes
-
Volume 1, No. 1, February 2009
Volume 1, No. 2, December 2009
Volume 2, No. 1, December 2010
Volume 2, No. 2, October 2012
Notes for Contributors
Practitioners‟ work based projects should be emailed as Word attachments to the
Journal‟s Editors where they will be summarised and edited.
Articles for a double blind review should be emailed to the Journal‟s Editors as Word
attachments. The first page of the manuscript should include the title of the paper and
the author's name, affiliation, address, telephone number and email-address.
The second page should contain the title of the paper, an abstract (150 words) and
up to five key words.
Correspondence will be only with the first author.
References and citations should follow the BNU Harvard style (latest version
available on request). However ensuring accuracy and compliance is the
responsibility of the authors.
Subscription
Subscription to the Journal of Crowd Safety and Security Management – An Online Journal
is currently free.
Contact Us
Ali Bakir (Editor in Chief) [email protected]
Stuart Kirk [email protected]
Owen Grainger-Jones [email protected]
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Editors’ Statement
The Journal of Crowd Safety and Security Management – An Online Journal (JCSSM) is an
educational, industry oriented journal which is designed to serve as a forum for practitioners,
scholars, and students who are actively engaged in the academically fledgling industry of
crowd safety and security.
The Journal seeks primarily to publish:
a) Summarised and edited versions of practitioners‟ work-based projects. The aim is to
share and disseminate the findings of these projects to a wider audience.
Practitioners‟ projects are selected, not necessarily because of their methodological
rigour or the significance of their findings, rather they are chosen because of the
relevance and importance of their work to the current development in the industry.
Although practitioners‟ projects are summarised and edited, the responsibility for the
rigour of the research and the validity and reliability of the findings remains with the
authors.
b) Good quality well developed industry-based research articles after subjecting them to
double blind reviews.
In addition, the Journal will publish essays, discussion and research notes, book reviews,
and commentaries. The overriding aim of the Journal is to contribute actively to the
professionalisation of the crowd safety and security industry by creating a platform which
encourages dialogue between the industry and academia, and promotes research and good
practice.
The Journal is published twice yearly, and the Editors will strive to include in each issue:
Abridged and edited practitioners‟ work-based projects
Articles subject to double blind reviews (up to 8000 words)
Research notes and discussions (description of work in progress.
Industry views (perspectives from practitioners)
Book reviews
Commentaries
News, events, education fora, conferences, seminars
Note: We have increased the word limit of the refereed articles and removed it from
the section “Other articles, research notes and commentaries” to give authors more
room to express and discuss their ideas.
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Contents:
Introduction by Professor Chris Kemp
(p5)
Practitioners’ work-based projects (edited and abridged):
1 Media security: Is the story worth the risk?
Neil Swinyard-Jordan
June 2010
(pp. 6-13)
2 The effect of high-speed communication on crowd attendance and behaviour at events
Eric Stephen Stuart
May 2010
(pp. 14-21)
3 The impact of weather-related hazards on risk assessment strategies for open-air events in
Central Europe
Sabine Funk
May 2010
(pp. 22-34)
4 A study into competence, training and reputation of event safety stewards in Denmark
Morten Therkildsen
May 2010
(pp. 35-47)
Other articles, research notes, and commentaries
5 An exploratory study into market demand for work-based and e-learning education
programmes in Crowd Safety Management
Owen Grainger Jones
May 2010
(pp. 48-62)
6 Review of pedestrian and evacuation simulations
Professor G. Keith Still
August 2011
(pp. 61-73)
7 Concert patron safety
Professor Gil Fried and Dr Andrew Milsten
August 2011
(pp. 74-85)
8 Simulation-aided planning for events
Ulrike Merz, Tobias Kretz, Markus Wiersch,
Carola Schulz, Peter Vortisch
June 2011
(pp. 86-104)
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INTRODUCTION
Professor Chris Kemp
May 2012
The Journal of Crowd Safety and Security Management was created to support the
development of innovative practice, scholarly activity and solid research delivery in the areas
of crowd management and security. The first three volumes have been well received and this
Journal is a crucial part of the International Centre for Crowd Management and Security
Studies‟ drive to support safer events and festivals. The team has worked hard on this issue
to enable further research and scholarship in this area to be viewed by both educational and
industrial partners throughout the world. With the Olympics in London fast approaching the
development of knowledge and the support of research in this area is crucial to create legacy
activities that can be utilised in a range of superscale events across the world including the
Brazilian World Cup, the Commonwealth Games and both the Rugby Union and Rugby
League World Cups.
Looking at recent events such as the Oxford and Cambridge boat race, The Love Parade
and the nightclub incident in Northampton England it is easy to see why this type of Journal
is so important. It is easy to believe that there is a panacea for all of the event disasters,
which have happened. However, it is clear that the type of elements which impinge on the
safety of events are so many and varied and so difficult to predict that constant updating of
knowledge and research is the only way to ensure the safety of people at events. Of course it
is impossible for us to negate risk altogether however, it is possible for us to put in place risk
assessment and management tools which can be utilised to reduce the dangers at events
and to reduce the liabilities of those delivering such events if used properly. Vigilance,
constant updating and never taking things for granted are all key in helping people to
organise events in a safe and efficient manner.
Crowd management and security companies are constantly updating their training and
education to try to come to terms with the ever-changing dynamics of the event. Through
such developments new technology and training methods are applied to help support those
making operational, tactical and strategic decisions. The more datasets that are to hand for
the decision makers and the more historic knowledge of the event process that those making
decisions have the more able they are to make immediate decisions if an aspect of an event
starts to go wrong. It is this area that the University is at the moment designing research
activities so that we can support companies across the world in being able to support their
events in a more efficient and effective way.
I hope that you enjoy reading this volume of the Journal as once again the editorial team and
those providing papers have created a rich tapestry of interwoven threads across the
industry.
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1 MEDIA SECURITY: IS THE STORY WORTH THE RISK?
Neil Swinyard-Jordan
June 2010
Abstract
The aim of this study was to examine Media Security teams and their methods of operating in
both developing and high risk countries around the world. It sought to review those elements
regarded as essential for an effective media story and how this balances with the need to
ensure their personal safety and protection. High value news stories are often gained from
dangerous situations, but effective risk assessment and comprehensive planning before,
during and after the „piece to camera‟ (PTC) is thought to be essential. Adequate planning and
preparation require the completion of hostile environment training by all staff. It has been
shown that where there is an option to have a security individual or team, then this should be
taken up. Regular rotation of all personnel is found to be essential to ensure individuals
remain focused without becoming excessively stressed or complacent. In planning a story in
a high risk location the entire team has to be involved. This encompasses not only the details
of the media piece to be covered, but also the specific roles of team members, in terms of
technical and security aspects. Planning for the PTC includes agreement as to who has the
final authority to determine if the risks are too great and the opportunity for a story will have to
be lost.
Introduction
The large number of international journalists covering conflicts is intensifying competitive
pressures; this can push them to take unwarranted risks. The Institute of War and Peace
(2004) stated that “during the last decade 346 journalists have been killed doing their job”.
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Such incidents may be the result of unavoidable, unpredictable accidents, or stem from a
failure to adequately analyse the risks to safety and security.
The Institute of War and Peace (2004) training manuali addresses journalism safety. It
provides advice on what should be done to minimise risk. Security training courses are now
available for media personnel but these can lead to a false sense of security and a failure to
adequately consider the potential threats of each situation. Despite such guidance, many
journalists still work without proper preparation, adequate health insurance or training for
dangerous encounters. No set of principles, training course, or handbook can guarantee a
journalist‟s safety but the risks and mitigating factors for each unique story opportunity must
be considered before the „operation‟ begins.
In February 2007, the author was taken hostage in Baghdad with a very well known BBC
journalist and several employees. Although only a short period of captivity, it raised the
question of how much journalists will risk for their exclusive story or picture. When does the
risk exceed the value of the story and how do you identify when this point has been reached?
Method
Research on media security commenced with a detailed literature review, which included
publications produced by organisations set up for the safety of journalists. Interviews were
conducted with 39 individuals who work, or have worked, for the BBC. These included 16
Reporters, 3 Cameramen, 1 Engineer, 5 Producers, 13 Security Advisors and 1 Logistics
Manager, providing a holistic insight into media security from both sides of the camera.
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Findings and discussion
What is Media Security?
Media security is the physical and personal security of members of the press, whether they
are presenters, cameramen, producers, members of the radio and/or written journalism
profession. Security advisors CG & SK explained that the modus operandi for the BBC was
modelled on the work of undercover intelligence units operating in Northern Ireland at the
height of the „troubles‟. Use of non-descript, old vehicles that do not draw attention allows
the media team to move more freely around their desired location. Considerable effort is
invested by the BBC to ensure that their vehicles are not noticeable and weapons are carried
discreetly. The security team members will often assist in setting up the „piece to camera‟
(PTC), or holding sound equipment. This ensures they remain close to the people they are
protecting and the casual passer-by is less likely to identify the security staff and wonder
what is going on. Reporter NA stated that “the security team are always thought of as crew
members, not as security at all” and this inclusion in the team is important.
Physical security is required in order to protect infrastructure, whether rented or purchased
by a media company in a high threat location, such as Baghdad. This usually comprises of a
bureau/broadcast areas plus accommodation. Within the bureau security office, an
operations room will be set up, with CCTV cameras showing all access and weak points
reporting back to a bank of monitors. Teams out on the „ground‟ will be monitored by radio
communication and GPS signal.
Security advisor HS stated that “in the event of an emergency the security plan is put into
action as second nature. This may involve an evacuation procedure or simply a way of
locking down the location and waiting for the danger to pass or holding it off until support
arrives.”
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In comparison, few members of the written press have any form of security, whether working
as individual freelancers or as permanent staff contracted to a large broadsheet. Radio
journalists are much the same; however, those working for the BBC will fall under the inhouse security team umbrella and will usually deploy to high risk areas with a dedicated
security advisor.
What makes a good story?
To provide an effective media news story there are certain elements and values that need to
„come together‟ in order for it to be effective and desirable. These include:
Frequency - events that occur suddenly and fit well with the news organisation's
schedule are more likely to be reported than those that don‟t.
Meaningfulness - the ability of the audience to relate to the topic
Conflict - opposition of people or forces resulting in a dramatic effect.
Negativity - bad news is more newsworthy.
„News value‟ determines how much prominence a news story is given by a media outlet and
the attention it is given by the audience. Boyd (1994) states that “News journalism has a
broadly agreed set of values, often referred to as „newsworthiness…”. It is not universal and
can vary widely between different cultures. In Western countries, decisions on the selection
and prioritisation of news are made by producers on the basis of their experience and
intuition. Galtung and Ruge (1965) showed that several factors, such as conflict and
frequency are consistently applied across a range of news organisations. Schlesinger (1987)
include areas that are politically, morally and legally sensitive and Ryan (1991) states "there
is no end to lists of news criteria" (p.31).
In order to get a good story the journalist must usually operate in direct danger or areas of
high risk. It is at this point that the story has to be looked at and the security issues must be
matched against achieving the aim. Two seasoned reporters, MJ and DL both agreed with
these proposals and noted that “younger reporters are doing more of the dangerous work,
however, they are kept firmly in check by the Producer or Bureau Chief (usually a senior
Producer). To go against the agreed plan can result in that individual being replaced”.
Producers cannot risk being personally liable for an enthusiastic individual who leaps into a
situation without fully considering the ramifications of their actions.
Factors to be considered in planning a high risk story
Training
One of the first things to be considered when planning a high risk story is the training of the
Media Team. This is preparation for those individuals who will be working in a high risk or
high threat area, rather than the technical training needed in order to operate the associated
equipment. It is an understanding of the environment, its potential threats and an awareness
of how to act or react to an incident. This is commonly called Hostile Environment Security
Training (HEST). HEST for the BBC includes classroom based lectures and day long
practical exercises, delivered over three to five days and specifically tailored for the location
to be worked in. The BBC has an in house HEST team and according to HD and GJ, two of
the regular instructors:
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The course has to be constantly changed, threats change and there may not be the
need for specific lessons on building security for instance, if you‟re operating
alongside the military…Or if the threat of abduction or being taken hostage is high
then, rather than give a standard forty minute classroom lesson we may spend a
night carrying out a practical exercise, trying to induce certain feelings and stages of
capture that personnel could find themselves in.
The BBC has the resources to carry out this training, however, independent freelance
journalist struggle to afford the course, at costs of £3000 to £4,000. Hence freelancers often
take on assignments without a real understanding of what to expect.
Permanent Specialist Security Team
The BBC has identified that, in many high risk situations, it is essential to have staff focused
on security threats who are not distracted by the technical aspects of the story. In early
2003, reporter MJ was covering the early stages of the second Gulf War; the team of three
had been operating in the region for some time and for the preceding two days were subject
to regular Iraqi artillery fire. MJ decided to report from as close to the frontline as possible
and took a local Kurdish soldier with them. The team drove to an area recently vacated by
the Iraqi Army and pulled off the road. As soon as they got out of their vehicles explosions
began and two of the team were hit, one fatally. Unknowingly they had pulled off the road
into an overgrown minefield, which the local soldier had not known about. MJ stated they
were focused on the story and a possible artillery attack, but hadn‟t considered minefields.
He suggested that, had a member of the BBC‟s permanent security team been with the
team, the vehicle would probably not have been allowed to pull off the road. The security
officer would be more likely to recognise the potential threat as he/she would be focused on
the environment and security issues, rather than the potential story.
Final Authority
If the media team is to include a security advisor there is an obvious need to clarify who has
the final authority for a high risk story to be covered? In early 2007, a BBC team was
working in Baghdad. They wanted to finish a film in an extremely high risk part of Baghdad.
This required detailed risk assessments, authority from key locals, and the deployment of the
full in-house armed security team. The security team drove around the area declaring it quiet
and once local permissions were received; „London‟ gave the final authority for the story to
be covered.
As the team pulled up to the location and got out of the vehicles, they were surrounded by
more than 50 armed militia. They were taken hostage whilst release negotiations were
carried out. Once released, the media crew, less the security advisor, left Baghdad the next
day. The area was immediately placed out of bounds by the BBC and procedures were
examined. It transpired that procedures had been followed and could not be faulted. Local
authority figures had promised security and no amount of planning, risk assessing, final
authority or any other security practices would have averted this incident. It has to be
recognised that not every eventuality can be covered.
The BBC procedures direct that on the ground the security advisor has the final say. This
can create tensions with strong personalities who don‟t perceive the same level of risk. It is
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essential that final authority is agreed by the team prior to departure and fully supported on
the ground.
Liaison
Successful and positive liaison is essential in gaining access to unique situations and
locations, particularly where there is military activity and the threat is high. Security Advisor
CW was working with the BBC team covering the conflict in Georgia two years ago. He
explained,
My role was constant liaison for the first five days we were in the country. As a
former Royal Marine I was able to understand military body language, when and how
to approach checkpoints, who to speak to at places we wanted to film at and build
relationships throughout my time there both on the Russian side and the Georgian
side, with military, police forces and civilian authorities.
This understanding of the military proved essential.
Detailed Team Planning
All members of the BBC production and security teams are involved in planning an
assignment and will work in the hostile environment for no more than four to six weeks.
Rotation is essential to allow individuals to switch off from the constant threat.
The eight man in-house security team has a broad range of experience which maximises the
skills and experience which can be utilised for each unique situation. The team comprises of
an ex- Royal Military Police Close Protection Officer – they are considered to be the military
experts in Close Protection (CP) work in hostile environments around the world. There are
three ex British Special Forces Group soldiers who completed a military CP course and bring
small team tactics, covert work and drills experience to the role. Finally a former New
Zealand SAS soldier plus three ex- Royal Marines all have in depth hostile environment
military experience and four years or more work experience with commercial companies and
the BBC High Risk Newsgathering Team. In addition there are four main planners and
management personnel based in London.
There is a huge variety of technical and HEST experience within the production crew. The
producer/ reporter/cameraman may be very senior and familiar with the location or it may be
their first time in a hostile environment. This mix of personalities and backgrounds is
essential to ensure an effective, knowledgeable and experienced team. The involvement of
all staff in planning ensures common understanding of actions to be taken in the event of an
incident.
Conclusion
In conclusion, media security is viewed as essential to minimise the risk to the media crew
and ensure that the external, physical, personnel and story aspects are all given adequate
consideration. A high value news story is often gained from dangerous situations but an
effective risk assessment and comprehensive planning before, during and after the PTC is
felt to be essential to prevent loss of life and potential financial damage to the employer.
Adequate planning and preparation is believed to include completion of hostile environment
training by all staff to enhance the awareness of individuals to potential dangers and to
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promote correct action if something does go wrong. It has been shown that where there is
an option to have a security individual or team, then this should be taken up. Security
advisors can remain focused on crew safety and not distracted by the detail and production
of the media story.
The study also found that positive, effective liaison needs to be carried out at every
opportunity; it opens doors and can be a tool to enhance safety in extreme circumstances. It
can provide timely and accurate information that may be crucial in deciding a location or
timing for a story. A good balance of skills and experience in the team, of both production
and security personnel, is found to enhance the opportunity for liaison and also maximise the
likelihood that someone has a solution for a unique challenge. It is also argued that regular
rotation of all personnel is essential to ensure individuals remain focused without becoming
excessively stressed or complacent.
Finally, the study showed that in planning a story in a high risk location the entire team has to
be involved, not only to encompass the details of the media piece to be covered, but also the
specific roles of team members, in terms of technical and security aspects. Planning for the
PTC is argued to include agreement as to who has the final authority to determine if the risks
are too great and the opportunity for a story will have to be lost.
As planning cannot take into consideration every eventuality, the art, this study suggests, is
to minimise the risk and ensure that all personnel are able to respond positively and
effectively to danger when it arises. Whilst there will always be pressure for the media to get
the unique story, with high news value, findings from cases in this study indicates that no
story is worth risking the loss of a human life.
It is recommended that further research is undertaken to determine if the factors applicable
to security of BBC media crew are also relevant to other large corporations, such as CNN. In
addition, there is a need to examine the security of the freelancers who often cannot afford
HEST or the luxury of a permanent security advisor. They are often in greater danger and if
injured, or taken hostage it may be some time before anyone is notified of their predicament.
How can they enhance their personal security at minimum cost, whilst still achieving the
exclusive story that will provide their income? Similarly more detailed research could be
conducted to compare the various training courses available and how they are regarded by
the different media companies.
References
Boyd, A. (1994) Broadcast Journalism,Techniques of Radio and TV News. Oxford: Focal
Galtung, J. & Ruge, M. H. (1965): The Structure of Foreign News. The Presentation of the
Congo, Cuba and Cyprus Crises in Four Norwegian Newspapers, Journal of Peace
Research, vol. 2, pp. 64-91; online edition http://jpr.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/2/1/64
Institute for War and Peace Reporting. 2004a. Reporting for change: A handbook for local
journalists in crisis areas (Chapter 14 Journalism Safety) [internet]
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Available at: http://southsudaninfo.net/wpcontent/uploads/reference_library/14_iwpr_training_manual.pdf
[Accessed 1 February 2010].
Institute for War and Peace Reporting. 2004b. Reporting for change: A handbook for local
journalists in crisis areas [internet]
Available at: http://southsudaninfo.net/wpcontent/uploads/reference_library/00_iwpr_training_manual.pdf
[Accessed 1 February 2010].
Ryan, C. (1991) Prime Time Activism: Media Strategies for Grassroots Organizing Boston:
South End Press
Schlesinger P. (1987) Putting 'Reality' Together, 2nd edition London: Methuen
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2 THE EFFECT OF HIGH-SPEED COMMUNICATION ON CROWD ATTENDANCE AND
BEHAVIOUR AT EVENTS
Eric Stephen Stuart
May 2010
Abstract
This research project considered the consequences of media and marketing forces on those
attending events. It sought to assess the impact on crowd numbers, and the mood and
behaviour of those attending. The key methods used were a survey to establish the likelihood
of response to influences of certain groups. This was supplemented by interviews with two
industry experts. The investigation showed that there are factors occurring in society that
might impact upon event audiences. The first of these is the increasing willingness of people,
especially younger people, to travel to events that interest them. The second is the ability of
people to travel to events. In a generally more affluent society with people having access to
transport, it is feasible they may be more likely to travel to be entertained. Marketing media
needs to be monitored closely on the build up to any event to ensure carefully laid safety plans
are not impacted by the arrival of excessive numbers. Furthermore, to ensure public safety at
events, a structured means by which such media is monitored and responded to must be
established.
Introduction
This research project looks into the impact of high-speed communication and media
influence on public safety at events. It aims to: ascertain if modern media methods and the
speed of transmitted news impact on people‟s behaviour; discover whether news and other
media can „direct‟ people to attend events; examine if, as a result, there is a likely increase in
numbers attending such events; discuss if the numbers and behaviour are likely to have an
impact on public safety at events; consider if organisers should be monitoring such media;
and consider if a legislative approach to planning for events would assist in increasing public
safety at those events.
There appears to be a growing number of events worldwide where anticipated public
attendance seems not to match the number arriving on the day (Still, 2010). In planning any
event, competent organisers and authorities assess the estimated numbers of people
attending, crowd profile, and likely behaviour of the crowd (Health and Safety Executive,
2000). This is in order to ascertain the level of physical and human resource needed for
public safety, as advised in Managing Crowds Safely, HSG154, Health and Safety Executive
(2000). The Event Safety Guide clearly states the need for effective planning that includes
the prevention of hazards and risks through identification, elimination or control (Health and
Safety Executive, 1999).
“During the planning stage it should be compulsory to include crowd condition monitoring, or
the plan should be rejected” (Still, 2010, p2). Crowd behaviour modification is a vital area;
Kemp, Hill, Upton, & Hamilton (2007) argue that the information supplied to a crowd in
advance of an event affects the items they bring, and ultimately, their behaviour at that event.
Clutterbuck (1973) states that it is highly unlikely that a happy, satisfied crowd will turn
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riotous unless motivated by the need to change a significant part of that event, or it becomes
otherwise stimulated by external forces. Still (2010, p1) defines “crowd crazing” as being the
term used when a “promoter or marketing group hypes a product (or offer) in order to create
a large, excited crowd.” He describes the practice as „very dangerous‟ when not undertaken
in conjunction with careful crowd management strategies and cites the phenomenon as
being responsible for many deaths around the world.
Method
People behave in different ways under stress, especially in crowd situations (Nygren, 2007),
and whilst this study attempts through quantitative analysis to explain some of that potential
behaviour, observations are also made and expert views sought to help understand such
behaviour.
Quantitative methods were in the form of a questionnaire that was administered to a wide
profile of people. Forty-nine surveys were returned, and although this is a small sample, the
results were useful and supportive of the qualitative data obtained from observation and
interviews.
Two expert participants were interviewed: Dr G Keith Still, a professor of crowd dynamics
and Phillis Dorris , who has worked for ten years in „online marketing‟ as part of the Derren
Brown online marketing team along with the television company „Channel 4‟. Mr Brown and
his team are engaged in television illusion and Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) and
similar influences that might be used by marketing companies to influence crowds and crowd
behaviour.
To try to ensure that the outcome of one interview did not influence the other, the interviews
took place some weeks apart and answers were checked by an independent party.
Findings
The interview with Dorris indicated that some people are capable of, and are, being
influenced to behave in a certain way. Questioned as to what percentage could be
influenced, she cited a television show by Derren Brown. In this show he tried to persuade
people that they were „stuck‟ to their chairs. Dorris states, “around thirty five per cent of the
people polled were stuck to their seat”. The phenomenon is developed by Professor Still who
outlined some Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) techniques called anchoring and
triggering, explaining that “these are well documented in a number of marketing/NLP books.
It creates a sense of association and motivation to attend”.
The prospect of such powerful influences is impressive,. this is especially so when
considering the optimum group size to influence; Dorris continues,. “The live shows are
around 1500 people, this is a good size”. A crowd of that size, in a public place, influenced
to behave in a certain way, would be highly problematic in a public order context. If thirty-five
percent could be influenced, then genuine „crowd control‟ could be achieved.
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It is broadly accepted now, by those involved in crowd control that only a small proportion of
a crowd needs to begin to misbehave unchecked for others to follow suit. This is known as
the emergent norm theory (Turner and Killian, 1957, 1987). In short, unchecked behaviour,
witnessed by others, is then copied as they consider it to be more acceptable. This is
precisely what occurred on 3 April 2010. American Apparel advertised a sale through social
networking sites. 2,000 people attended and long queues formed. Reports suggest the
queues were orderly until two males decided to „jump ahead‟, causing others to break away
from the queue to try to get to the doors (BBC News Channel, 2010). The disorder that
ensued led to ten officers being injured (Fittes, 2010). It follows therefore, that if an external
influence can affect even a small proportion of a crowd that portion can then impact the
behaviour of some, if not all, of the remainder of the crowd.
Questioned in relation to an age group that might be more susceptible to such tactics, Dorris
suggests that those over the age of fourteen have a propensity to „follow suit‟ more, and that
“seventeen to twenty four” is the age group that would maximise success in influencing a
group.. This is consistent with analysis of the research, which suggests that the age group of
ten to thirty is the most likely to be influenced by a media campaign. Disregarding gender,
only eighteen per cent of those over thirty had acted upon a mobile communication message
to change their plans. Forty per cent of those under thirty had acted in such a way.
All forty-seven respondents stated they had mobile phones or similar devices. This is
indicative of just how many people now have immediate access to information. Whilst only
about thirty percent had any form of „news alerts‟ set up on the phone, a similar percentage
(albeit not necessarily the same groups) acknowledged that they had changed plans
because of news from their phone. Broken down by gender, only six per cent of responding
males claimed to have been influenced in this way compared to forty three per cent of
responding females. This statistic must be treated with caution though, as the age range of
the male group was considerably older than the females‟, and this loading may have skewed
the figures.
Asked if they might travel to see a hero, or person of great interest to them, as a result of a
phone message, only forty six percent of male respondents agreed they would, compared to
eighty-seven percent of females. This aggregated to seventy five percent of all respondents,
some willing to travel up to 200 miles but with an average of about twenty six miles.
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Males prepared to travel by age group
Females prepared to travel by age group
51 to 60
Unlikely to travel
51 to 60
41 to 50
31 to 40
31 to 40
10 to 20
Unlikley to
travel
21 to 30
21 to 30
10 to 20
Dorris was able to show that spending on online advertising has increased from five percent
to twenty five percent in just five years. This increase in spending by some four hundred per
cent, in such a relatively short business timeframe, clearly shows how advertisers are
cognisant of the power of modern media.
The phenomenon of crowd crazing is not new but instant knowledge of incidents or events,
and therefore the numbers responding, is Professor Still states “it is a feature of popular
culture and growing rapidly as both marketing and media reach more people on the echatter”. In July 2002, around 60,000 people were expected to attend a concert for „Fat Boy
Slim‟ (Norman Cook) on Brighton beach. Over 250,000 actually attended the event after
unprecedented radio reporting and reports in newspapers, internet and magazines. None of
this had been noted by, or brought to the attention of, the Safety Advisory Group who had
insisted it was a low profile event and numbers would not be excessive (Brighton and Hove
Council, 2002)
Major issues occurred throughout the day and were exacerbated in the evening when a
turning tide began to trap thousands on the beach. The debrief paper shows that all the
warning signs were present indicating that this was likely to be a far larger event than
planned. Still explained; “This event is a great case study on how marketing reaches
masses. The event plan needs to consider this kind of crazing (larger than expected
numbers), in another location this could have been catastrophic”.
Another incident on 7th April 2005, which followed the death of Pope John Paul II,
documented by Stuart (2005), is an example of serious underestimation of numbers. No one
anticipated that people would drive from Poland and throughout the UK for a commemorative
event. Initial estimates were of fewer than 1,000, and with the prospect of a non-conflictive
crowd attendance, a relatively young and inexperienced command and policing team were
selected. These officers were tested when over 20,000 arrived. Important lessons were
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learned, that modern communications and transport freedom was seriously impacting on
previously tried and tested methods of estimating numbers.
During research for this study, a potentially dangerous flashmob incident was advertised. In
newspapers and websites around London, „Dead Man Running‟ began to advertise £5,000
„cash drop‟ at Liverpool Street Railway Station (View London.co.uk 2010). The event was
reported to the authorities and action taken to prevent it. The „stunt‟ was rescheduled at short
notice and took place in Trafalgar Square on 5th March. Angry members of the public later
complained that they had wasted hours waiting for the event, which consisted mostly of fake
and monopoly money being dropped (Bertoncini, 2010). The consequence of this „stunt‟
indicates that it is not simply the attendance of additional numbers at an event that is of
concern, but also the mood and expectation of those attending.
Here, it is worth discussing the impact of media upon the Beijing Olympic Torch Relay in
London on 6th April 2008. In the twelve months leading up to the arrival of the Olympic
Flame, whilst it was clear that a level of anti Chinese protest was always going to occur, the
protest was mostly low key. However, 10 March 2008 was the 49th anniversary of the Lhasa
uprising and riots of 1959 that had led to the exile of the Dalai Lama. Tibetan monks had
seized on the „Olympic opportunity‟ to protest and to march against the Chinese. Within
weeks, dozens were dead and the world‟s media was reporting how unarmed civilians had
been shot dead by Chinese police (BBC News Channel, 2008). From the first „Torch Lighting‟
at Wembley, to the lighting of the cauldron hours later in North Greenwich, the procession
was subject to unlawful and often violent protest.
What appeared odd at the time was that those causing the abuse almost appeared
embarrassed and ashamed of their actions just seconds after the flame had passed. Still
explains this as “bystander behaviour”, one of the phenomena of crowd psychology; “namely
that the acceptable norms are suspended in the situation and crowd norms take temporary
precedence (it‟s OK as others are doing it too)”. This behaviour is indicative of the emergent
norm theory (Turner and Killian, 1957, 1987) discussed previously.
The link that draws all of these events together is the lack of predictability of crowd size and
behaviour that came about as a result of advertising campaigns, deliberate or otherwise. Still
espouses a belief that the issue is not necessarily the numbers of people that arrive at an
event, but the space to put them in and their arrival profile. That profile would include the
mood in which they arrive. At the incidents referred to above, those charged with trying to
keep crowds safe failed to anticipate numbers or mood, through a lack of accurate
information. In many of the cases, the numbers and mood have been affected by media
influences.
Where the crowd exists, there is also a loss of individualism within that group. Whilst Le Bon
(1995) has been discredited in some quarters, his work formed the only theory of crowds for
many years. His belief that those within a crowd lost all sense of individuality is now generally
no longer accepted, but his theory on the power of the crowd is still supported (Drury and
Reicher, 1999). In essence, there is a strong belief that individual identity is replaced by
social identity within a crowd environment (Stott and Reicher, 1998). Asked about the
difficulties with crowds at large scale events, Assistant Commissioner Chris Allison of the
Metropolitan Police London responded: “People use the cover of the crowd to do stuff that
they would never have the bottle to do as an individual, but when they were in that crowd
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they felt they had the power to do it, they had the mentality, they were willing to take a step
further”.
In its „key messages‟ section of a recent three hundred-page report entitled “Understanding
Crowd Behaviors” (Cabinet Office, 2009), the Emergency Planning College lists seven
factors for successful crowd management. Included within these are the needs for: Thorough
planning and preparation, adoption of a system wide approach, coordination between all
agencies, and communication with the crowd. Each one of these factors will be impacted by
crowds arriving in numbers and a mood not anticipated by organisers or authorities. The
report acknowledges there is still considerable work to be done (Cabinet Office 2009).
Conclusions
This research suggests that the media and marketing messages circulated prior to events
can significantly affect the attendance at those events and impact upon their mood and
behaviour. There is currently no formalised method for assessing the extent of the media
impact on events. Furthermore, there is no guidance or help to suggest what research
organisers, licensing authorities, or those assessing the safety of events, should undertake.
For some organised and most licensed events, Safety Advisory Groups (SAGs) will take
place and may question the advertising and marketing policies on their impact on the event.
In many of the cases discussed though, no such SAG exists. This study thus recommends
that SAGs should be compulsory across the UK, they should be regulated and have
appropriate expertise for the event being planned. They should also have agreed principles
for examining likely attendance.
A larger research project into the impact of media and marketing on attendance and
behaviour is required. The survey should consider impacts by age groups, sex and
willingness to attend events. This would give a far better picture of the likelihood of
unexpected numbers attending at events.
A further research project should ascertain the national picture in relation to the status of
SAGs. A survey of all local authorities should be conducted to discover exactly how many
have SAGs as a statutory body that examines all events.
National recommendations are needed regarding the necessity and frequency of SAGs, the
training and skills of those who attend, and standardisation of agenda that includes media
and marketing impacts upon the event. One proposal could be that any event of any nature
where the numbers are likely to exceed 500 or 1000, should be subject to formal notification
to the local authority and police, for consideration of SAG to be established.
References
BBC News Channel (2008) Police „shot at Tibet protesters‟ [online]. BBC. Available from
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7307382.stm [Accessed on 2 January 2010].
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BBC news Channel (2010) American apparel sale closed in London after scuffles
[online]BBC. Available form http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8601361.stm [Accessed 4 April
2010]
Bertoncini, A. (2010) Short-changed? 'Dead Man Running Cash drop‟ film publicity stunt
leaves some disappointed [online] . West End Extra. Available from.
http://www.westendextra.com/news/2010/mar/short-changed-dead-man-running-cashdrop%E2%80%99-film-publicity-stunt-leaves-some-disappointed [Accessed 6 march 2010)
Brighton and Hove Council. (2002) Operation Omaha – Operational Debrief. Unpublished
Cabinet Office. (2009) Understanding crowd behaviour. [Online] Emergency planning
college. Available from: http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/media/228106/guideforreaders1.pdf
[accessed 23 Oct 2009).
Clutterbuck, R. (1973) Protest and the urban guerrilla. London: The Camelot Press Limited.
Drury, J. and Reicher, S. (1999). The intergroup dynamics of collective
empowerment: Substantiating the social identity model of crowd behavior.
Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, 2, 381-402
Fittes, A. (2010) Metropolitan Police Initial Debrief Report, American Apparel incident.
Unpublished.
Health and Safety Executive. (1999) The Event safety guide. 2nd ed. Norwich: HSE Books.
Health and Safety Executive. (2000) Managing crowds safely 2nd edition: a guide for
organisers at events and venues. Norwich: Her majesty‟s stationary office.
Kemp, C. Hill, I. Upton, M & Hamilton, M. (2007) Case studies in crowd management.
Cambridge: Entertainment Technology Press.
Le Bon, G. (1995). The crowd: A study of the popular mind. London: Transaction Publishers.
(Original work published in 1895).
Nygren, M. (2007) Simulation of human behaviour in stressful crowd situations. MSc. Thesis,
The Royal Institute of Technology School of Computer Science and Communication.
Stuart, E. (2005) Metropolitan Police Debrief Report, Polish commemoration of Pope John
Paul II Funeral, unpublished.
Still, K. (2010) Crowd Crazing [online]. Crowd Dynamics. Available from
http://www.gkstill.com/CrowdCrazing.html [Accessed 2 March 2010].
Stott, C and Reicher S (1998) Crowd action as intergroup process: introducing the police
perspective, European Journal of Social Psycology, Available from
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http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/(SICI)1099-0992(199807/08)28:4%3C509::AIDEJSP877%3E3.0.CO;2-C/abstract [Accessed 2 March 2010].
Turner, R. H. and Killian, L. (1957). Collective Behavior. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey:
Prentice Hall.
Turner, R. H. and Killian, L. (1987). Collective Behavior (3rd Edition.). Englewood Cliffs, New
Jersey: Prentice Hall.
View London.co.uk (2010) Dead man running free money at Liverpool Street [online]. View
London.co.uk. Available from http://www.viewlondon.co.uk/whatson/dead-man-running-freemoney-at-liverpool-street-s-article-9345.html [Accessed 22 February 2010].
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3 THE IMPACT OF WEATHER-RELATED HAZARDS ON RISK ASSESSMENT
STRATEGIES FOR OPEN-AIR EVENTS IN CENTRAL EUROPE
Sabine Funk
May 2010
Abstract
This research project addresses the most common weather-related hazards such as
thunderstorms and heat, which can have dangerous consequences. It provides an insight into
the audience and production managers‟ perception of weather hazards and the problems
faced by the latter. Interviews were conducted and questionnaires issued to try to gain a better
understanding of the topic and the problems faced by both production managers and the
audience. The findings of this limited investigation show that the common approach of “postdisaster improvisation” has to be changed to “pre-disaster planning”. Both production
managers and the audience felt that knowledge of the risks of severe weather was necessary
to affect behaviour; for the audience this would change their behaviour and for the production
manager it would assist in making plans to deal with the risks. Both groups also felt that
information and communication are key factors for everyone who has to deal with the impact
of severe weather. The research shows that weather-related impacts often result from
organisational, structural, or communication failures between both sides of the event production and audience.
Introduction
The research project deals with the impact of weather-related hazards on risk assessments
for open-air events in Central Europe. It seeks to discover what type of hazards arise from
severe weather at open-air events, how the audience reacts to these hazards and what the
implications are for an event's risk assessment.
For the purpose of this paper the definition of severe weather given by the World
Meteorological Organization (WMO) will be used:
“Dangerous meteorological (…) phenomenon, of varying duration, with risk
of causing major damage, serious social disruption and loss of human life,
requiring measures for minimizing loss, mitigation and avoidance, and
requiring detailed information (…) to be distributed as soon as possible to
the public and responsible authorities.” (WMO, 2004)
Considering weather-related incidents in Central Europe during the summer seasons 2006 –
2009 and following a definition of risk as a combination of severity and probability, the first
question addressed in this paper is which kind of weather phenomena can be assessed as a
hazard for open-air festivals. Secondly, are the production management and festival
audiences willing and able to react to these hazards.
As a production manager of an open-air festival, weather is a topic of essential interest.
Having also worked at an event where two people died by a lighting strike, improving the
understanding of the impacts of extreme weather became a driving force for this study.
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The weather factor
Impacts of weather-related hazards need to be seen as risks that can be managed and not
as unavoidable „Acts of God‟ as some promoters refer to it, especially after deadly incidents.
Of course there will always be situations that no one is able to predict or assess – but there
are other situations, so called weather related incidents, which actually result from improperly
built structures or a lack of planning and organisation. Denying this means losing the chance
to learn and prevent similar situations from happening.
The knowledge of incidents related to the impacts of severe or extreme weather has
increased during the last few years. This may be a result of climate change worsening
weather conditions in Central Europe and/or improved media coverage. This can be
evidenced by not only searching for key words like “severe / extreme weather” or
“thunderstorm” in combination with “festival” or “event” at the homepage of the video portal
youtube (www.youtube.de) but also when looking at newspapers and magazine articles,
which are for example collected in the European Severe Weather database, available from
(www.essl.org/ESWD/).
Conferences dealing with production safety or crowd safety1 feature the topic on their
agendas and insurance companies are starting to offer special insurance covering “weather
as life threatening danger”, “Insurance against loss in sales due to enduring rain” for
example2.
The reason this research is important is that the weather phenomenon is not yet properly
reflected in published literature and guidance. During the last few years a considerable
amount of literature has been published giving very detailed and specific guidance on many
aspects of crowd management, crowd safety and health & safety for the event industry. In
contrast there is only general and limited guidance on the factor of “weather”. Kemp (2004)
points out that both an increase of heat or rainfall could cause problems (p 14), Tarlow
(2002) enumerates some points about reducing the risk of electrical storms (p 162) and the
HSE Event Safety Guide (1999) finds “weather, e.g. excessive heat /cold/rain” (p 32 : 193)
on the list for an event risk assessment. In all publications, weather seems to be a universal
factor which has to be considered within a risk assessment for an event however the
coverage of this topic is not sufficient. It is reduced to abstract warnings and general
statements that weather can have problematic or even dangerous impacts on an event (HSE
Event Safety Guide 1999; Tarlow, 2002). In 2007 Kemp published the outcomes of a series
of health & safety seminars by the European Festival Organisation YOUROPE and found
“climate issues” and related topics (pp 180 – 187) were some of the key factors with which
festival organisers have to deal. Even in a new publication regarding the Management of
crowd safety at outdoor street/special events by Kemp, Moore and Mellor (2010) where
“weather was identified as an aspect of significance for outdoor events” (p IX) very little
guidance is given in the checklist.
1
IPM – International Production Meeting, London, March 11th & 12th /
Yourope's 9th Health & Safety Seminar, Groningen, January 14 and 15
2
Available from http://www.erpam.com accessed 04.05.2010
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Risk Assessments and resulting crowd management plans for open air festivals will not be
adequate without a deeper look at the consequences which can arise from the impacts of
extreme weather.
Among professionals working in the field of crowd safety there is increasing concern that the
number of weather-related incidents will rise, not only due to changing climate but also due
to the increasing number of open-air events of all kinds throughout Europe and the World.
Method
Both qualitative and quantitative methods were used to gather primary research data.
Secondary research was also undertaken to provide background information especially on
meteorology and audience behaviour.
Problems and limitations of the research
During the early part of the investigation two problems arose: Firstly, while carrying out pilot
interviews and questionnaires with the chosen target group “promoter”, it soon became
obvious that this group wouldn‟t offer helpful answers and information. The reasons for this
were that the promoters referred to their production managers as being the experts on site
and only gave very vague answers especially when it came to negative experiences.
Secondly, information about the number of people being injured due to weather related
incidents was unreliable. This was due to the fact that statistical information about deaths
could easily be researched in the media, whereas the number injuries could only be given by
the promoters. Even where the numbers were known it could not be stated clearly if an injury
was weather related or not.
Research sample
It was initially decided that data would be collected from individuals who were members of
the European festival organisation YOUROPE. Due to the creditability of this organisation it
was felt the data would be more reliable than using other sources.
The quantitative data was collected by means of a questionnaire from the audience by
publishing a link on different festival online platforms (forums, facebook groups) and making
it possible for everyone to respond (respondent-completion) online.
The quantitative data collected by means of a questionnaire, completed by production
managers, was a purposive sample - respondents had to have experience as production
managers of open-air festivals in the time period 2006-2009.
The qualitative data collected from both groups via interviews was a purposive sample experience with open-air festivals in the time period 2006-2009.
Data collection
Interviews
According to Silverman, interviews seek to find out how individuals “perceive things” (2010,
p.190). This was an important factor for interviewing both production managers and
members of the audience because it was crucial to gather information about their
perceptions of weather as a hazard.
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Data collection took the form of in-depth interviews with seven people working or who have
previously worked as production managers for open-air events and with twelve people
having experience as visitors of open-air festivals. Two pilot interviews were carried out for
each target group.
Interviews were held in English and German and took between one and two hours. A
checklist ensured that the same questions were asked for all interviews. They were recorded
digitally, translated and transcribed in word format. The anonymity of all interviewees was
maintained.
Questionnaires
Data collection took the form of questionnaires provided online to members of the audience
and individuals working or who have previously worked as production managers for open-air
events. Pilot questionnaires were carried out with members of both target groups - both
resulted in minor changes in the structures of the questionnaires. Questionnaires were
provided through “Surveymonkey” (available from http://www.surveymonkey.com) in German
and in English.
The link for the audience, with a short introduction, was posted in different festival forums
and in festival groups on the social network platform Facebook (available from
http://www.facebook.com).The initial sample of the audience was 342 people. The link for
Production Managers was sent to them personally but with the possibility to forward to
others. The initial sample of production managers was 21.
Not all respondents answered all questions, some of the questions allowed multiple answers,
the percentage was calculated based on the number of completed answers to the question
(n).Both questionnaires were developed to collect self-reported data and consisted of a
combination of closed and open questions. All online questionnaires were answered
anonymously.
Data analysis
The closed questions of the questionnaires were analysed with tools provided by
“Surveymonkey”. Open questions from the questionnaires and interviews were analysed
manually. Though very time-consuming this provided an in-depth familiarity with the data
which helped when evaluating the findings. A data collection sheet was designed to
categorise answers to open questions.
Primary Research was supplemented by an analysis of relevant secondary sources, i.e.
documents referring to meteorology, crowd management and crowd safety.
Findings
A large proportion, 78% of the audience and 86% of the production managers4 who were
interviewed or who answered the questionnaires had experienced adverse weather of
different kinds.
3
3
n=354
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60.00%
52.80%
50.00%
40.00%
31.40%
30.00% 23.60%
22%
20.00%
10.00%
28.50%
23.30%
16.20%
9.10%
7.40%
3.60%
1.00%
0.00%
Audience: questionnaire: Did you ever experienced severe weather while visiting open-air festival? n=342
Knowledge & Perception
During the interviews with both groups it soon became obvious that the planning for weather
related impacts was based on personal experience. 75% of the audience5 and 86% of the
production managers6 answered that “own experience” was their main source of knowledge
that would influence their behaviour.
This was supplemented by quantitative research of those who had experiences. 57% of
production managers who had incidents with structures or people related to severe weather
and 58%7 of the audience who had the experience of feeling unsafe due to bad weather,
have changed their perception of the topic after the incident.
Relying on their experiences, 67% of the audience8 considered themselves adequately
prepared, and 58%9 think that weather is not a dangerous hazard. In contrast only 18% of
the production managers10 felt adequately prepared and 86%11assessed weather as a
dangerous hazard for open air festivals. This is to a degree supported by meteorological
literature - according to the WHO Regional Office for Europe
“extreme weather events will continue to pose additional challenges (…) in
terms of risk management and the reliability of infrastructure (…) and
others. Every effort should therefore be made (…) to put in place evidence
based interventions and where necessary precautionary measures to limit
4
n=28
n=12
6
n=7
7
n=302
8
n=285
9
n=285
10
n=28
11
n=28
5
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the impacts on the environment.” (Cited in Kirch, et al, 2005 : p XVIII;
emphasis added)
However personal experiences alone are not sufficient evidence, further information is
needed. Menne (2005) points out that there is still no common understanding about what
measures are needed and no comprehensive European data base. He states:
“With better information, the emphasis in disaster management could shift
from post-disaster improvisation to pre-disaster planning.” (Kirch et al,
2005 : p XXXVI).
General weather related problems
Both production managers and audience were asked what problems have they had with
severe weather. The production managers naturally have a long list, the audience on the
other hand have had fewer problems – a contrasting result to the findings discussed above.
General problems named by more than 35% of production managers:
no tested emergency plans
no emergency plans for staff (leading to dangerous situations for staff working under
severe weather circumstances)
communication problems with other companies working on site etc
not enough shelter / no places of safety
behaviour of the audience
communication problems with the audience
o technical – for example at night / on campsites
o perception and ignorance
not enough budget to realise proper measures
lack of knowledge
no support / understanding from promoter
General problems named by more than 35% of audience members:
no places of safety / no shelter
no adequate clothing (even when checking forecasts)
no warnings from promoter
“no problems – it‟s a festival and weather is weather”
Weather-related hazards
The WMO considers the weather to be severe or extreme in the following events:
Thunderstorms and the phenomena that accompany them, heavy rain, strong wind/ wind
gusts, hail, lightning, flash floods, and extreme temperature.
Production managers and audience concurred with some of these categories; they perceived
the weather to be most dangerous at an open-air festival, if there is high winds,
thunderstorms, enduring rain, and hail.
Considering the definition of risk as the probability that an adverse event will occur and
including the consequences of that event, Ebi (2005, cited in Kirch et al, 2005, pp 47-56)
calls for different strategies for high probability events with low consequences and for low
probability events with high consequences.
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However the assessment of “enduring rain” as a dangerous event shows, that especially for
the audience, both categories seem to be important. One of the interviewees suggests the
following explanation,
“It‟s not really dangerous due to injuries, but you‟ll get so frustrated and
f**ked off when it won‟t stop raining the whole day. You‟re freezing and you
know that you get a cold when you‟re at home. It‟s more dangerous for
your personal morale”
This perception cannot be neglected by production managers or crowd managers because
organising 30,000 people in a state of low morale can easily turn out to be a problem when it
comes to a situation where the co-operation of the audience is needed.
Thunderstorm
Looking at the festival seasons 2006 – 2009, thunderstorms were wide spread over Europe.
But as thunderstorms are complex phenomena with multiple accompanying variables (heavy
rain, lightning, strong wind gusts), a closer look is needed.
The main reasons for assessing thunderstorms as dangerous were given in the interviews:
fast development / no preparation time
local wind gusts / collapsing structures
lightning strikes /”because they are dangerous for everything”
can lead to a panic (fear of lightning strikes)
Lightning strikes
According to UCAR (University Corporation for Atmospheric Research), lightning strikes kill
more people than any other kind of bad weather. But because lightning usually kills people
one at a time, it tends to be underrated as a hazard12.
Only 21% of the audience13 assessed lightning strikes as dangerous – mainly because no
one had any relevant experiences:
“I‟d be more likely to win the lottery”
“there are so many structures around – why should it hit me?”
But this perception misses an important factor which makes lightning strikes dangerous:
more people are killed by a high-voltage current reaching out from a lightning bolt than by
being struck directly14.
This is considered more of a hazard by production managers, especially by those who work
on green fields and who had to think about natural hazards such as trees. Interviewees had
experiences of people seeking shelter under trees – although in one case messages were
given to the audience not to do that.
High winds
Looking at the incidents 2006 - 2009, high winds were the cause of fatalities in some of them,
for example
12
http://www.ucar.edu/communications/factsheets/Lightning.html accessed 23.04.2010
n=336
14
(http://www.ucar.edu/communications/factsheets/Lightning.html accessed at 23.04.2010
13
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Canada, Big Valley Jamboree Festival : stage collapse (one death)
Slovakia, Pohoda Festival : tent collapse (two deaths)
Germany, Southside 2007 : tent collapse (one death)
High Winds are assessed as the most dangerous weather phenomenon by production
managers, even if structures are built properly, according to building regulations and
standards, local wind gusts can have a disastrous impact, not only on big but also on small
structures.
All production managers interviewed offered at least one example of the consequences of
high winds:
brandings / banners on towers and fences (sometimes installed by agencies
without being checked by the production team)
material not properly stacked (eg wooden pallets)
wet mesh (getting heavy and loosing the ability to let wind pass through)
merchandise tents, bar tents, concession stands: not properly secured by the
owners
Although 40% of the audience15 thought that high winds were extremely dangerous, there
also appears to be a sort of “danger–seeking” atmosphere around this phenomenon.
This is evidenced by findings on the internet portal YouTube, where videos and
commentaries show a common message: THIS IS FUN:
“EPIC! What a weekend”16
“hehe that was so cool”17
“The camping was almost destroyed by the wind...but was good fun” / “the
space created by the blown away tents made way for some great parties”18
Hailstorms
According to the Tornado and Storm Research Organisation (Torro)19, hailstorms, normally
lasting between 2 and 15 minutes, have been the cause of costly and deadly events
throughout history.
As hailstorms are relatively infrequent and not even known in some parts of Europe, only
14% of the audience20 and 25% of the production managers21 thought that a hailstorm was
dangerous. However, when considering the incidents resulting from hailstorms, they must the
rated as the most dangerous weather phenomenon for open-air events because no other
phenomenon is able to cause a panic like a hailstorm does. Fruin (1993) cites the example of
15
16
n=314
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MyO5Z4MK-rE accessed 23.04.2010
17
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIcGv-Omets&feature=related accessed 23.04.2010
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08QYNP13VbE&NR=1 accessed 23.04.2010
19
(available from http://www.torro.org.uk/site/hail_extremes.php accessed at 23.04.2010 )
20
n=314
21
n=28
18
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a sudden violent hailstorm in Katmandu in1988, where 30,000 people tried to flee from the
hailstones and more than 100 died and 700 were injured. Though these people did not die
from hailstones alone, it can be assumed that rain instead of hail would not have led to such
a panic.
Hailstorms also have a considerable financial impact according to one of the world‟s leading
insurance companies Deutsche Rück in 2006 two short and very heavy local hailstorms in
Southern Germany caused more than 100 injuries and 150 million Euros of damage to
structures.
Enduring rain / flooding
Considering the relatively small number of injuries due to enduring rain it is not assessed to
be dangerous, but can lead to an increased stress level both with audience and staff. One
production manager said that it‟s hard to motivate staff to work safely in enduring rain:
“They rather want to finish work in a hurry and don‟t care about safety. The
Atmosphere in general is difficult due to an increasing amount of frustration
which accompanies enduring rain.”
When enduring rain is accompanied by flooding the situation is dependent upon the
preparedness of the promoter. As long as there is the possibility for a warm shower or a dry
place to stay (as could be seen perfectly at Roskilde Festival 2007) the audience does not
really complain:
“it‟s part of the open-air feeling”
“if you can‟t stand this, you should not go to an open-air festival”
“if it‟s too hard, I sleep in my car – so there‟s no problem at all”
Rain also is something that 85% of the audience is prepared for, either by bringing rain
jackets and rubber boots or:
“bringing freezer bags to put around my stockings“
“bringing folding shovel to dig a ditch around my tent“
“bringing rubbish bags to be prepared to slide through the mud“
This last quote highlights an issue which was discussed by the production managers: people
sliding through the mud, dancing in the mud or throwing mud at themselves; 10% of the
audience think this is really fun. In these conditions campsites have all kinds of waste and
other emissions on the ground that cannot be seen. Behaviour like this is extremely
dangerous leading to injuries such as, cuts, bruises, electrical shock and skin irritations from
such things as emissions on the ground, waste, insects or animal bites.
Heat
Heat is a less known form of severe weather. This was also expressed by one production
manager who stated:
“I think the most difficult one is heat as nobody would allow you to cancel a
show because of heat”
This was especially true for the festival season of 2006 as the whole of Europe was hit by an
extreme heat wave.
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Only 21% of the production managers22 and 30% of the audience23 assessed heat as
dangerous – but with regard to crowd management plans for festivals it is a factor of
paramount importance for security and the medical services. Heat can cause hypothermia,
heat cramps, heat strokes, dehydration and sunburns both to audience and staff. Especially
in dense crowds in front of the stage where there is no air movement which is necessary to
dissipate heat, dangerous situations can arise. Additionally, the “use of drugs such as alcohol
or amphetamines may predispose subjects to heat illness by changes in physiological
effector mechanisms and by changes in behaviour.” (Havenith 2005, cited in Kirch et al,
2005, p.77)
As a method to cool down 18% of the audience suggested using drizzling water – a measure
which all production managers agreed was ineffective.
“it only gives them the feeling of being fresh and they do not drink or even
leave……. They‟re still dehydrated and overheated and they should feel
that they are.”
37 % of the audience thinks that the promoter should provide free drinking water on the
whole festival site – a measure which is discussed among the production managers. On the
one hand it is regarded as a good service and welfare measure - on the other there is a
strong feeling that the audience should take care of itself and that providing free drinking
water is something no one would expect anywhere else– especially as the promoter normally
gets income from selling drinks. 21% of the audience suggested that providing cheap
drinking water would be a good idea – a suggestion which is supported by most of the
production managers as a good compromise that promoters may be able to live with.
The question of warnings
When asked what the audience expects from the promoter, „early warnings‟ was an
important factor in the audience‟s expectations. 78% suggested that the promoter should
give early information and 100% of the production managers thought that the audience
expect warnings.
This is also supported by the literature, for example Menne (2005, cited in Kirch et al, 2005,
pp 265 - 272) states that “early warning is widely accepted as a crucial component of
disaster risk reduction”. Fruin (1993, p _ ) speaks of a “duty to warn”.
“a legal view of crowd management responsibilities requires that crowd
participants be informed of foreseeable dangers associated with crowd
behaviours and /or assembly facilities.”
Though there was the unquestioned opinion that warnings are necessary, problems arose
around the question of when the information and warnings should be published and what
kind of information should be given.
Some production managers‟ responses:
“warn them too early, no one would react – and if they did react, I‟d get
problems with the promoter when people go home too early”
22
23
n=28
n=314
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“what shall we tell them? Go to their cars? Stay in the tents? Go home?”
Everything we say can have consequences to their health”
Some audience responses:
“I don‟t know if I would react to a warning – it depends upon the program”
“Of course warnings are a good thing, but unless the promoter can offer
shelter – what should we do?”
Although it might be difficult to implement, Ebi (2005, cited in Kirch et al, 2005, p.48)
suggests:
“Although disasters due to adverse weather and climate events cannot be
entirely prevented, primary prevention, particularly development of early
warning systems, can reduce the number of adverse health outcomes that
occur during or following an event. Current primary prevention activities,
where they exist, are generally limited to (…) inform the public what to do
(and not do) during or immediately following an event (…) an effective early
warning system should both reduce vulnerability and increase
preparedness”
Conclusions
The purpose of this research was to ascertain the perceptions of production managers and
audiences of the most common weather hazards.
The findings show that there is a general understanding by both groups of the hazards of
weather at open-air festivals but that the assessment of the hazard is strongly dependent
upon the individual‟s personal experience.
Among the obvious hazards are thunderstorms, with its accompanying variables (rain, wind,
hail, lightning strike). In addition heat has to be considered, although at first sight this does
not seem to be a dangerous hazard.
The findings also suggest that, in addition to properly built structures, communication is a key
factor in both pre-disaster planning and post-disaster management. Only when everyone
involved has a clear understanding of what might happen is there a chance that emergency
plans – if they exist - can be realised.
It is hoped that this limited investigation will serve as a basis for future studies leading to a
deeper understanding of the impact of weather-related hazards on open-air events. More
research is necessary to look at the different variables of “severe weather” in detail for better
preparation and planning.
In summary there is a need to have a better understanding of the impact of severe weather,
improved risk assessment and therefore preparation for open-air events.
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References
Deutsche Rück (2009) Sturmdokumentation 2008. Düsseldorf : Deutsche Rück. (translation
& explanation by the author: “stormdocumentation 2008”. “Deutsche Rück” is Germany's
biggest re- insurance company)
Ebi, K.L. (2005) Improving public health responses to extreme weather events. Cited in
Kirch, W.; Menne, B. and Bertollini, Roberto (eds.) (2005): Extreme weather Events and
public health responses. New York: Springer. pp 47 - 56
Fruin, John J (2002) The causes and prevention of crowd disasters. Originally presented at
the First International Conference on Engineering for Crowd Safety, London, England, March
1993.Revised for crowdsafe.com, January 2002.
Havenith, G. (2005) Temperature regulation, heat balance and climatic stress. Cited in Kirch,
W.; Menne, B. and Bertollini, Roberto (eds.) (2005): Extreme weather Events and public
health responses. New York: Springer. pp 69 - 80
HSE (1999) The Event Safety Guide. London: HMSO.
Kemp, C. and Hill, I.(2004) Health and safety aspects in the live music industry. Cambridge:
Entertainment Technology Press.
Kemp, C.; Hill, I.; Upton, Mick; Hamilton, Mark (2007) Case studies in crowd management.
Kemp C, Moore T and Mellor P (2010) A review of the Management of crowd safety at
outdoor street/special events. Norwich UK, HSE Books
Kirch, W.; Menne, B. and Bertollini, Roberto (eds.) (2005): Extreme weather Events and
public health responses. New York: Springer.
Menne, B (2005) extreme weather events: what can we do to prevent health impacts? Cited
in Kirch, W.; Menne, B. and Bertollini, Roberto (eds.) (2005): Extreme weather Events and
public health responses. New York: Springer. pp 265 – 272
Silverman D (2010) Doing Qualitative Research London: SAGE Publications.
Tarlow, Peter E. (2002) Event risk management and safety. New York: Wiley event
management series, Wiley & Sons.
World Meteorological Organization (WMO) (2004) Workshop on severe and xxtreme events
forecasting. Workshop Paper. Toulouse: WMO.
www.wmo.ch/pages/prog/www/DPS/Meetings/.../Doc3-1(1).doc
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http://www. youtube.de (accessed 30th November 2009)
http://www. essl.org/ESWD (accessed 30th November 2009)
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4 A STUDY INTO COMPETENCE, TRAINING AND REPUTATION OF EVENT SAFETY
STEWARDS IN DENMARK
Morten Therkildsen
May 2010
Abstract
This study looked at the present standard of training and competence of safety personnel
working at events in Denmark. The research instruments were questionnaires administered to
stewards and audience, and interviews with national and international experts from the event
safety industry. More than 300 Danish stewards and 400 people attending concerts and
events participated in the survey. The findings suggest that: the steward training program in
place is not documented properly and not all stewards participate in it; the industry has a
minimum safety standard and that regular security guards do not live up to that standard;
official training programs for stewards are welcomed by the industry and stewards, provided
that the industry has a say in the creation of these programs; and that events in Denmark are
considered safe, but a continuous development in safety is recommended. There is also a
general welcome for an official on job training program that is relevant for the event industry,
provided that it keeps the possibility for volunteers to stay in the industry.
Introduction
This study is concerned with the training of stewards working at events, concerts and
festivals in Denmark. It sought the perceptions of crowd safety working crew of the safety
standard in the industry, and their views on the need for an official training program; it also
sought the views of audiences at events. Ambrosius (2009a) found no requirements of
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training for concert stewards, and a working group of the National Commission of the Danish
Police has recently recommended that all security personnel working at events must be
authorised and receive seven weeks of training (Ambrosius, 2009b). This would suggest that
there is a lack of training. However, as no proper research in the training standard has been
conducted; vital questions remained unanswered over whether the industry has a minimum
standard that it adheres to; and whether this standard is adequate as perceived by stewards,
audience, security managers, and foreign experts. This research is thus timely, and may be
useful to the police national commission working group and training institutions. The study
also looked at the training setup in Norway, Holland, Switzerland, Germany, and England in
order to compare the Danish standards; to gain knowledge of the required safety training;
and to help in suggesting new standards, if needed. The study will not cover sport stewards,
as a law regarding their training has recently been passed, although, some of these stewards
work regularly at concerts and will, therefore, be part of the survey.
In 2000 a recommendation for instituting relevant courses for volunteers and stewards
working at festivals was made by a working group set up by the Danish Government
following the accident at Roskilde Festival on July 14th 2000 where nine young men died
(The Ministry of Culture, 2000). The Norwegian Safety Hand Book for Running Concerts and
Festivals (Danielsen, 2006) stressed the importance of the competence and experience of
safety personnel in planning an event. The 2003 Licensing Act introduced in England, Kemp
et al. (2007) claimed, brought the industry and academia closer together, and marked the
start for the Degree courses in Crowd Management. In Denmark there are currently three
training programs that lead to a license in safety and security. For security guards, the
program is 15 days and contains training in law, conflict management, personal safety,
reporting, guarding, first aid and basic firefighting. An addition of five hours training qualifies
a security guard to be licensed as football steward. The Security guard program is offered to
people who guard properties, transfer money, and receive alarm signals or supervise
companies. (Ministry of Justice, 1986) It is also for people who provide close protection, but
not for safety personnel. For doormen, the program is eight days training in law, service,
conflict management, first aid, and basic firefighting evacuation. The doorman program is
more relevant to events; however, it lacks event education, and is designed for doormen at
bar and discotheques.
Football stewards, on the other hand, receive 25 hours training in law, good hosting,
personal protection, cooperation with authorities and colleagues, evacuation procedures,
searching, and conflict management. Part of this program contains event education,
focusing on managing crowds and audiences. This program was developed in cooperation
with the Danish Football association, and is only available to football clubs. In addition, there
is an official two-day course in crowd control, focusing on training in evacuation procedures,
radio communication, command and control structure, and other crowd control topics.
Although this course is available, less than 100 students attended the course in 2009
(Uddannelses Guiden, 2010). Some festivals and concert promoters in Denmark might have
their own training in place. The Guide to Safety at Outdoor Music Events (Department of
Justice and Department of Culture [n.d]), however, suggested that proper training and
development of appropriate competences are made available to the safety personnel and
that a log book documenting these competences is provided. Hopefully this research will
show that the recommendations following the tragic death of nine young men in July, 2000,
had been implemented, and that proper training and documentation in the area are provided
by crowd safety personnel working in Denmark.
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Method
This study adopts a pragmatic, qualitative and quantitative research as they complement
each other (Veal, 1992). Craig (2009) pointed out that quantitative research is used when a
researcher involves a large number of subjects with the purpose of quantifying behaviours;
qualitative research, he added, involves a small group or an individual. This study used
quantitative research in the form of self – administrated questionnaires on the internet. Faceto-face questionnaires were also used, as it is a relatively simple and straight forward
approach to study beliefs (Robson, 1993).
The quantitative research was conducted in two phases that ran simultaneously and involved
event safety stewards and audiences at events. Stewards were asked what kind of training
they have, whether the training can be documented, and if they believe they are competent
to do the job.
A link to an internet based self – administered questionnaire was sent to event safety
stewards. The link was distributed via festivals, football clubs and event companies; all
providing safety on regular basis at concerts and events. This was the best way to reach a
large number of stewards in a short time period. 442 Danish event safety stewards
participated and at least 350 full answers received.
In addition, nonparametric data was collected with the use of a Likert scale (Craig, 2009),
asking audiences attending a concert a series of questions regarding their views of the
stewards and safety in general. The data was collected by using a face–to–face
questionnaire, where the response rate, according to Robson (1993), is medium/very high.
However, reaching the audience turned out to be more challenging than expected. A lack of
relevant events in the few months where the research was undertaken decreased the
opportunity to reach the audience. A team of volunteers assisted in collecting responses from
audiences at two events; in total this provided the research with 298 responses. Due to the
lack of events a self – administered questionnaire was created on the internet, and a link to
this questionnaire was distributed via friends and co-workers; 163 additional full responses
were received. In total 461 persons answered questions about their opinion on event safety
in Denmark.
Qualitative research was also undertaken, interviewing a small number of selected people,
having with them a “conversation with a purpose.” (Lincoln & Guba, 1985). The purpose of
these interviews was to get professionals opinion on the standard of event safety and,
especially, on the training standard in Denmark. Face to face semi-structured interviews
were held with two heads of security personnel from the industry in Denmark. A semistructured interview was chosen as this gave the interviewer the possibility to get the
answers that were needed in a short time, but still allowed room for expanding the area of
which issues could be discussed (Robson, 1993). These individuals were chosen because of
their unique work and inside knowledge of the industry, as both work with event safety on a
very regular basis.
In order to avoid only interviewing people who hire, train or otherwise are responsible for the
standard of the training for the Danish Stewards, a few foreign representatives were also
interviewed. The third interviewee is a cofounder of an official training program in a
European country and an author of a training book for event safety officers. The interview
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was unstructured and could be compared to a lengthy intimate conversation (Robson, 1993)
as it took place backstage at a concert in Holland. The fourth interviewee, who used to work
as Head of Security for a very well known international rock band, shared his insight on
Danish safety standard. This interview took place in England and was semistructured. In
addition to these face to face interviews five other Head of Security personnel from Denmark,
Norway, Holland, Switzerland, Germany and one representative from a university in England
who teaches crowd safety management, were asked by email about the training and the
safety standard in their countries. As all of the above interviewed persons are very well
known in the industry it has been decided to keep their names anonymous.
Findings and discussion
Several of the people interviewed in this research claim that the background of a security
guard does not meet the necessary qualifications of an event safety steward, and as one
interviewee noted: “For some sick reason legislation considers a regular security guard
higher than an event security officer, therefore any security guard can work at events.”
Figures 1 and 2 show, that 72% of the Danish stewards, who responded, have more than
one year of experience and 55% of them worked at more than five events in 2009. A
significant number of stewards work at large numbers of events and have several years
experience within event safety. Flemming Schmidt from Livenation (cited in Ambrosius,
2009), who promotes concerts in Denmark, explained that the present system ensures
continuity and experience amongst the stewards. The large number of events operated by
the stewards would support this statement, and as one of the Danish heads of security who
participated in this research mentioned; “Although they are voluntary workers they burn for
their job. It is a way of living, as I see it.”
Another interviewee thought highly of the Danish stewards‟ dedication and insight: “Event
Denmark should be happy that there are so many stewards who want to do this work. If they
are paid or not they are dedicated in relation to the work they do and they keep the wheels
turning.”
Figures 1 and 2 show the experience of the Danish stewards who participated in the survey
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How many years have
you been working as
events saftey…
How many events have
you worked at during
2009?
1
27%
28%
0-5
14%
2-3
14%
45%
4-5
21%
24%
16-25
27%
More than 5
Figure 1.
6-15
more than 25
Figure 2.
Ambrosius (2009) also wrote that the audience should have certainty that stewards are
trained and licensed for the work. The survey showed that 58% of the participating stewards
have received the training to become football stewards and 26% of them are trained as
security guards (see Fig. 3). As mentioned in the introduction a security guard can obtain the
football stewarding license with additional training, which indicates that some stewards have
more than one license.
100
80
60
43
74
no
84
17
40
I have the training but not the
license
Yes
20
41
12
14
6
10
Danish Security guard
Danish Doorman
0
Danish Football
steward
Figure 3. The percentage of Danish stewards who are licensed
In relation to the use of the crowd control program, two interviewees felt that the program did
not teach the student what was needed. One interviewee retorted: “The training does not live
up to what it should”; the other interviewee added: “There is a huge difference related to who
teaches the course. There have been situations where the teacher was not really competent
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to teach. There are of course some teachers that are competent but the courses need to be
more stringent”. Expressing a view about trainers, another Interviewee stated:
“Training is only as good as the trainer, and if the trainer hasn´t gone out of the
office or out of the controlled environment and gone to different scenarios to
see how different procedures work. In my head, you know, they are only half a
trainer. A lot of the people who train stewards, at least in the UK, are agency
based staff who only teach a specific style.”
Interviewees also felt that the training program for the security guards is not suitable for the
event industry as it was created for security in malls and retail shops. The two Danish heads
of security said that they have implemented their own training programmes.
On the question of the type of event safety training received, this research showed that more
than 60% of the stewards received training in all the surveyed aspects, except self defense
and band profiling; and more than 80% received training in first aid (see Fig. 4). Frank Bill,
the security companies‟ representative in the National Commission of the Danish Police
working group, believed that safety personnel should at least be trained in first-aid (cited in
Ambrosius, 2009). This survey showed that most of the stewards have first-aid training. Also,
filtering the answers shows that 53 of 361 (14.7%) stewards have received no training at all,
supporting Ambrosius, argument that some stewards are untrained.
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
no
not sure
yes
Figure 4. The percentage of stewards who have received education in specific areas within
event safety
The Guide to Safety at Outdoor Music Events (Department of Justice and Department of
Culture. [n.d]) suggests that it should be possible to document the right training and
competences, and as figure 5 shows most of the stewards have received training, and are
able to document training hours, but also a significant amount of the training cannot be
documented.
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40.0%
35.0%
30.0%
25.0%
20.0%
Able to document
15.0%
Not able to document
10.0%
5.0%
0.0%
0
1-10 11-20 21-30 31-60 61-80 More
than
81
Figure 5 Training hours received by Danish stewards
The Dutch system is setup to undertake training to become an Events Security Officer. This
takes 24 hours of theory training, six to eight hours of home studies and 10 events with
practical training where a trainer is assigned up to 6 students at one time. Relating to the
quality of the Danish stewards, an interviewee stated:
“There exists no long term vision, there is no educational system that is being
forced by governmental bodies, there is no quality system, this lack is not the
fault of the operational stewards, they work in a great manner, but they need
crystal clear goals and objectives in their work at events otherwise their work
will always stay as it is until an accident happens.”
There is a significant number of stewards believing that an official safety education for
personnel working at all types of events is needed (see Fig. 6).
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Figure 6 Danish steward´s opinion on event safety education
Two intervieweesindicated that the company they work for is interested in promoting a
training education programme, provided it is relevant; they believe that the security guard
program is not very relevant. One of these interviewees stated:
“The authorities should involve the enormous knowledge bank in this country,
and abroad for that matter, and let them create an education on equal terms as
it was done with the training program for football stewards in Danish Football
Association (DBU). The heads of security from selected football clubs, together
with DBU, sat down and evaluated what should be taught. What kind of
demands should be given to the stewards? The same should be done with
this.”
He also emphasised that since they introduced their own training program they had a
significant drop in the number of evictions and physical handling of guests, and that the
statistics showed a 70% drop in the number of police reports taken at the venue. One of the
interviewees felt that flexibility and retaining volunteer safety stewards are important: “If a
system is too complex it might limit the possibility for festivals, smaller events and such to
stay in business.”
Expanding education for security guards with 4 weeks on job training (Ambrosius 2009)
might support the training within the event industry, but it will create a more complex training
program. And as Spokesman for Skanderborg Festival, Poul Martin Bonde pointed out that
Skanderborg Festival might not continue if all their volunteer stewards were to attend security
guard training.
The four interviews rated between 5 and 7 on a scale from 1 to 10, 10 being the best. Also,
the majority of respondents (76%) who attend concerts and events either strongly agreed or
agreed that stewards knew what they were doing, and only 10 % disagreed.
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42%
45%
35%
34%
25%
14%
15%
9%
1%
5%
-5%
Strongly
agree
agree
no opnion
disagree
strongly
disagree
I am certain the staff know what they are doing
Figure 7. 76% of the audience agree that Danish stewards know what they are doing
Furthermore, 92% of the stewards felt that they were qualified to fulfill their task as safety
personnel. Stewards also indicated that the Dutch and English practice where experience
with a trainer must be obtained before working independently is a good one, pointing to the
importance of retaining volunteers in the industry. This should also inform the new system
suggested by the working group of the National Commission of the Danish Police to have
flexibility to ensure that the present staff stays active.
Did you work at events in
2009 where you felt that you
were unqualified to fulfill…
2% 7%
92%
yes - that has
happened several
times
yes - that has
happened once
Figure 8. 92% of Danish stewards felt qualified for their task in 2009
A significant number of stewards (46%) felt that some of their colleagues were unqualified.
Some recurring comments demonstrated this feeling, such as; “large events working with a
lot of stewards”, “new stewards at work”, and “working in areas of the country where events
are seldomly held”.
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Did you work at events in 2009 where
you felt that one or more of the other
event safety personnel were…
11%
54%
35%
Yes - that has happened
often
Yes - that has happened
once
No
Figure 9. 46% of Danish stewards have felt that some of their colleagues were unqualified
Managing a large event requires more stewards than smaller ones. According to one
interviewee, a large event might have more than 500 stewards, and this means that the level
of experience and knowledge for the average steward is low. The same type of experience
pattern occurs, when events are held in areas where they do not often arrange events,
An interviewee pointed out that
“…the authorities in Copenhagen are used to events and have the necessary
routine procedure in evaluating if events are planned in a safe manner.
However, when an event is arranged in other parts of Denmark, where the
authorities are not used to see these types of events, authorities tend to have
less experience; the same applies for the safety staff. Experience is a
significant part of planning the events safely.”
Another interviewee stated that “even a large event in the middle of Copenhagen might be
arranged by people who have not decided who is responsible for what, and that affect the
safety.”
Experience also has a negative side, A third interviewee claims: “people responsible for
safety may not react in the required way, instead they do things because it has been done
this way for decades. There is no willingness to develop and event safety is money driven
and not primarily quality driven”. Frank Bill (in Ambrosius 2009) acknowledged that the
demand for higher training is partly financially driven. He feels that prolonged training and
licensing will create a better sense of security for the citizens. Nevertheless, on general event
safety in Denmark, 88% of the stewards think that Danish events are safe. The comments
that are attached to the steward‟s answers feature lack of education and focus as main
issues.
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70%
Do you believe that
events in your
country are run in a
safe way? (351
answers)
61%
60%
56%
50%
I believe
attending
events is safe
(456 answers)
40%
30%
29%
32%
20%
10%
4% 5%
6% 5% 1%
1%
I feel safe at
events (455
answers)
12%
Yes
0%
No
88%
Figure 10. Most audience believe events are safe.
Figure 11. Most stewards believe events are safe
One Interviewee, who has visited Denmark several times with more than one band and at
festivals, indoor venues, large and smaller venues all around Denmark, rated the Danish
safety compared to the rest of the world as: “probably quite high. Probably… It depends on
the artist but I would probably say a 7. I would never give much more to be honest, because
there is always training requirements, there‟s always managing errors and that sort of stuff.”
He is challenged by another interviewee who stated:
“If it was not for the few dedicated fireballs it would have been to hell, just to
use a minor polite word. I can see many venues, large as well as small, where
safety does not matter the most unless there is a person pushing and putting
pressure on, and saying that this is what needs to be done. The way of thinking
is not seen in Denmark... one does not include safety in the business case for
the event.”
Conclusion
The findings suggest that there is a steward training program in place, although it is not
documented properly and not all stewards participate in it; the industry does have a minimum
safety standard, and that regular security guards do not live up to that standard; that official
training programs for stewards are welcomed by the industry and stewards, provided that the
industry has a say in the creation of these programs; and that events in Denmark are
considered safe, but a continuous development in safety is recommended. The findings also
show that Danish stewards who participated in this research are very experienced, as 72% of
them have worked as steward for more than a year and 55% in more than five events in a
year. It is also apparent that there is a training system in use, and that some kind of training
is in place, although, much of the training is undocumented, suggesting that the
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recommendations of the Guide to Safety at Outdoor Music Events (Department of Justice
and Department of Culture. [n.d]) are not instituted.
There is also a general welcome for an official training program that is relevant for the event
industry, provided that it keeps possibility for volunteers to stay in the industry, as experience
is important in planning events (Danielsen, 2006). There is also recognition that self instituted
training programmes indicate that the industry has a minimum standard that they wish to
fulfill. Although, 90% of the audience and 88% of the stewards questioned believe events in
Denmark are safe, nevertheless, there is a general feeling that the industry needs an official
event safety training program, and that a regular security guard is not considered competent
for event work.
Further and more thorough research is required covering a larger area of Denmark, and
larger number of different events. As the stewards participating in this research represent
suppliers working on a regular basis in the industry, they might not have given a full view of
the steward‟s competence and training level in areas of the country where fewer events are
held. The findings also point to the need for benefiting from experts within event safety in
Denmark and internationally in creating a new on job training and education programme to
ensure that new stewards are competent before acting on their own.
References
Ambrosius, T (2009a) Concert security does not need education. [online]. MetroXpress.
Available from: http://www.metroxpress.dk/dk/article/2009/10/14/22/3652-83/index.xml
[Accessed 20 May 2010].
Ambrosius, T (2009b) Higher standards for concert security. [online]. MetroXpress. Available
from: http://www.metroxpress.dk/dk/article/2009/11/03/22/5046-83/index.xml [Accessed 20
May 2010].
Craig, D. (2009) Action research essentials. San Francicso: Jossey-Bass.
Danielsen, I. (2006) Sikkerhetshåndboken: For avvikling av konserter og festivaler. Bergen:
Norsk Rockforbund.
Department of Justice and Department of Culture. [n.d] Guide to safety at outdoor music
events. Denmark: Department of Justice and Department of Culture.
Kemp, C., Hill, I., Upton, M. and Hamilton, M. (2007) Case Studies in Crowd Management.
Lincoln, Y.S. & Guba, E.G. (1985) Naturalistic inquiry. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Ministry of Justice. (1986) Executive order regarding security business. (LBK 1986: 149)
Copenhagen: Ministry of Justice.
Robson, C (1993) Real world research. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing
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The Ministry of Culture. (2000) Cultural profile: Rock Festival Safety. (Chairperson: Ms. Anne
Knudsen). Copenhagen: The Ministry of Culture.
Uddannelses Guiden (2010) AMU educations [online] Available from
http://www.ug.dk/uddannelser/arbejdsmarkedsuddannelseramu/serviceerhvervene/vagtservi
ce/grundlaeggende_crowd-control.aspx?holdid=326579 [Accessed 20 May 2010].
Veal, A.J. (1992) Research Methods for Leisure and Tourism: A practical guide. Essex:
Longman.
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5 AN EXPLORATORY STUDY INTO MARKET DEMAND FOR WORK-BASED AND ELEARNING EDUCATION PROGRAMMES IN CROWD SAFETY MANAGEMENT
Owen Grainger Jones
May 2010
Photo: Bucks New University
Abstract
This exploratory study examines the needs of adult learners in the crowd management
industry for distance learning educational provisions. The perceptions of a convenient,
purposive sample of industry and student practitioners were sought. Four versions of a
questionnaire consisting mainly of open-ended questions were administered to this sample via
email. The findings suggest that there is a noticeable growth of events, and increased
professionalisation needing crowd safety management skills and requiring better provision of
distance learning education. There are also indications for a growing demand for crowd
management education from outside the UK, driven by a perceived high UK safety standard,
and quality Crowd Safety Management distance learning programmes. The findings also
suggest that legislation and civil lawsuits contribute to fostering a favourable climate for Crowd
Safety Management education. Reduced cost associated with workshop and more flexible
programme of study is seen as attractive to employers and students. The findings also point to
a concern that distance learning may cause a loss of peer to peer learning and relationship
development, which may need to be addressed by the design of any distance learning
programme. Key issues appear to revolve around pedagogical and delivery issues, all
requiring further research.
Introduction
The growth and professionalisation in the leisure industry, in particular the contemporary
events industry (Getz, 1997; Bowdin et al, 1999), has led to an ever increasing number of
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courses in various disciplines within the wider events management field. Whilst there is a
good number of event marketing and event production oriented programmes of education,
there has been until recently very little research into the safety management of audiences
and visitors to mass spectator events. The development of what is increasingly termed as
„Crowd Safety Management‟ (Upton, 2007) has largely been led by industry practitioners'
publications from concerned Government departments, and a small group of authors, for
example; Fruin (1971), Department of Culture Media and Sport (2008), Frosdick and Walley
(1997), Health and Safety Executive (1993, 1999 and 2000), Kemp et al (2004 and 2007),
Still (2000) and Upton (2007). The demand for educational courses for Crowd Safety
Management practitioners led in 2004 to the setting up of a Foundation Degree (FdA) course
in Crowd Safety Management at Buckinghamshire New University (formerly, BCUC).
The lack of a wider availability of information and knowledge in Crowd Safety Management
(CSM) theory and practice has led to a growing number of event professionals from the UK
and abroad to study the subject; a good number of leading crowd safety management
practitioners have undertaken studies in CSM through the University. Here the workshop
based model, or what is termed blended learning (Salmon, 2006), has been only partially
successful in widening participation due mainly to issues of geographic location and the
students‟ own employment circumstances. Furthermore, whilst much learning and reflective
practice take place among workshop cohorts, this learning is not being truly integrated and
disseminated within the wider student body and the events industry.
This study is inductive and exploratory (Brassington & Pettitt, 2003: 216); it attempts to
assess the potential for CSM distance learning courses and the changes that might be
needed to successfully bring together students from wider geographic, cultural and
professional backgrounds into the CSM programmes of Buckinghamshire New University. It
does this by exploring the size and health of the UK events market, perceptions of the need
for CSM education programmes, likely education requirements of CSM organisations,
reflections of graduates FdA CSM on syllabus and delivery, and opinions and thoughts of
current students on the FdA CSM programmes.
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Photo: Bucks New University
Literature Review
Event and crowd management literature
Whilst much has been written about the social and economic impacts of events and events
tourism, surprisingly little has been written about visitor or crowd management. Yeoman et al
(2004) state, “There are few texts that endeavour to cover the requirements of managing
visitors at a festival or event. This is strange when one considers how the satisfaction of this
intangible product, more than any other, is so dependent on the collective experience of
people who spend an extended period of time in close proximity to each other” (p. 65).
Literature to address the apparent omission of CSM has started to develop with books such
as Sport Facility Planning and Management (Farmer et al, 1996), Event Management and
Event Tourism (Getz, 1997), Event Management (Bowdin et al, 1999), Successful Event
Management (Shone & Parry, 2001), Event Risk Management and Safety (Tarlow, 2002)
and Festival & Events Management (Yeoman et al, 2004). However, this literature and others
are lacking in both substantial CSM content and focus on training and education of crowd
management workers.
Fruin (1971) cited in Upton (2007) defined crowd management as distinct from crowd control
in that it involves “The systematic planning for, and supervision of the orderly movement and
assembly of people. It involves the assessment of the people handling capabilities of a space
prior to its use. It also includes the assessment of the projected levels of occupancy,
adequacy of means of ingress and egress, processing procedures such as ticket collection
and expected types of activities and group behaviour”. Crowd control is defined as simply the
“restriction or limitation of group behaviour” (Upton, 2007: p72). This definition underpins
CSM writing in key academic text books such as, Sports & Safety Management by Frosdick
and Walley (1997), Health & Safety Aspects At Live Events (Kemp et al: 2004), A
Comparative Study Of Two Major Music Events (Kemp et al: 2004), Case Studies In Crowd
Management (Kemp et al: 2007) and From Rome To Rock N Roll by Upton (2007).
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However, whilst valuable in developing and widening knowledge of CSM, these publications
tend to have events types that are the focus of the narrative and, therefore, none can be
identified as the definitive publication on the management of crowds.
The subject of training and education in CSM is to some extent explored in Frosdick and
Walley (1997) as part of a discussion on the need for the further development of the Football
Safety Officers training and need for professional qualifications. Upton (2007) discusses the
industry issues behind the development of the FdA CSM, but as „From Rome To Rock „N‟
Roll‟ was written in 2006/07, it does not provide information on the widening student profile in
recent years and the greater numbers of tour security managers or overseas students who
have been undertaking their studies with Bucks New University.
Published Guidance in the forms of The Guide To Safety At Sports Grounds (Department of
Culture Media and Sport, 2008), The Event Safety Guide (HSE, 1999), Managing Crowd
Safety In Public Venues (Au S, et al, 1993) and Managing Crowds Safety (HSE, 2000) have
been available for some time, but while The Guide To Safety At Sports Grounds has been
periodically updated, most recently in 2008, neither The Event Safety Guide nor Managing
Crowds Safely have been updated in recent years. The Event Safety Guide was last updated
in 1999 and Managing Crowd Safely in 2000; thus these documents do not contain or reflect
recent developments in the management of crowds and events. However, it is worth noting
that although published seventeen years ago much of the best practice recommendations in
Managing Crowd Safety In Public Venues (Au S, et al, 1993) remain as pertinent now as
when published, and that these publications provide some useful discussion on the need for
staff training.
Key reports on crowd disasters such as: the Lord Justice (LJ) Moelwyn Hughes report on the
Burden Park Stadium disaster in 1948, the LJ Wheatly report on the Ibrox Stadium disaster
in 1971, the LJ Popplewell report on the Valley Parade Stadium disaster 1985 and the LJ
Taylor report on the Hillsborough Stadium disaster in 1989, are all readily available and
provide essential learning. Themes and recommendations contained in these reports have
provided not just the legal and moral impetus for the development of CSM training and
education but also many of the areas of best practice and methodology apparent in
Guidance Documents, such as; The Guide To Safety At Sports Grounds and The Event
Safety Guide.
Also available, albeit with a little searching, are reports on crowd disasters that offer detailed
information on the sequence of events that surrounded and led up to the particular crowd
disaster, these reports include: The Riverfront Arena Cincinnati USA 1979, The Monsters Of
Rock Concert Castle Donnington 1988, The Arad Festival Israel 1995, The Roskilde Festival
2000, The Ellis Park Stadium South Africa 2001, The Dig Day Out Concert Sydney Australia
2001. Event industry trade magazines such as IQ, Access All Areas, Live UK, Audience
Magazine, Venue Safety and Security Magazine and Main Event Magazine; all feature crowd
related topics and stories on a regular basis and to a lesser extent, even titles such as Event
Solutions Magazine and Total Production International feature crowd management related
articles periodically.
Online resources include The Journal of Crowd Safety & Security Management, The
International Centre for Crowd Safety and Security Studies, Crowd Dynamics. Com., Safe
Concerts.com, CrowdSafe.com, Major Events International.com, Event Industry News.co.uk,
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Security Oricle.com and IAAM.com; all feature news and articles related to Crowd Safety
Management to a greater or lesser degree. Other sources of available learning materials on
crowd related topics are radio and television documentaries; recent examples include:
documentaries on the fire at the Valley Parade football ground Bradford 1985, the crowd
crush at the Hillsborough football ground Sheffield 1989 and the crowd disaster at the Le
Mans motor race France 1955. Also a recent source for articles and resources that is of
increasing importance is BBC Online, YouTube, and other news media or social media sites.
Adult and blended learning literature
The other key area of literature of relevance to this exploratory study is that of education
literature that discusses, or focuses on adult and blended learning. Whilst none of the
authors featured below have written about education within the events industry or crowd
management sector, the generic issues and themes provide insight into the topic of adult
learning and the development of what has increasingly been termed flexible and distributed
learning.
Ramsden (2003: 19) claims that “study undertaken for the love of learning is the outcome for
which the lecturer must strive to achieve”. Whilst this is a laudable aim, it could be suggested
that it fails to recognise the primary motivations of many adult learners. Feedback from the
CSM students suggests that they are highly motivated by their work environment and that
they view their study as interesting and perhaps career advancing, but at all times
supplementary to their professional roles. This situation seems to concur with the theories on
the motivation of adult learners put forward by Knowles (1973) that “adult learners are
motivated to learn to the extent that they perceive the learning will help them better perform
tasks that they will confront in life” (1973: p82). This should not be viewed as necessarily a
bad thing, as for most people, and clearly for this group of students, their professional lives
are very important to them (Grainger-Jones, 2008).
Whilst a desire for personal development, undoubtedly, acts as a motivating factor (Maslow,
1948), the likelihood is that the desire to obtain an academic qualification in CSM is a
reflection of the competitive nature of the employment market within the events industry; as
Boud and Garrick 1999: p104), state “There are few places left for employees at any level
who do not continue to learn and improve their effectiveness throughout their working lives”.
The issue of recognition of skills and learning from within the workplace is important to the
student group as a whole and qualifications that recognise the student‟s abilities in a formal
framework is attractive to both students and employers. The role that education can play in
the formal recognition of learning is a key issue, quoting Jarvis (1998) Brownhill (1998: 60)
writes; “Education is a public phenomenon and provides public recognition of the learning
that it provides”.
On the topic of what work place learning is, writers such as Boud and Garrick (1999) and
Tosey and McNair, cited in Jarvis (2001) seem to concur that whilst “There is no single
theory of work place learning; instead there are various theories covering different facets”
(Boud & Garrick, p. 6). Tosey and McNair, citing Raelin (2000: 96), consider that workbased learning can however be distinguished from traditional classroom learning in a number
of ways:
Firstly work-based learning is centred around reflection on work practices; it is not
merely a question of acquiring a set of technical skills, but a case of reviewing and
learning from experience. Secondly work-based learning views learning as arising from
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actions and problem solving within a working environment, and thus is centred on live
projects and challenges to individuals and organisations. Work-based learning sees the
creation of knowledge as a shared and collective activity, one in which people discuss
ideas, and share problems and solutions. Also work-based learning requires not only
the acquisition of new knowledge, but the acquisition of meta-competence – learning to
learn.
For CSM education to be successfully assimilated into a wider education framework, industry
practitioners and academics must be provided with both the mechanisms and opportunity to
reflect upon the working practices. In his paper, „A Constructivist Approach To Online
College Learning‟, Rovai (2004) provides one model that might fulfil these requirements,
where he calls for a shift in study paths and education programmes better suited to workers
and adult learners needs. Rovai identifies the key issue of geographic location as being one
that can be overcome by the careful design and delivery of an education programme. He
further explains that the design and delivery of the programme must also strive to assist the
sharing of peer to peer learning which will both create a climate conducive to supportive
learning and independent „autonomous learners‟. Salmon (2006) supports Rovai‟s model and
highlights how „Constructivist‟ approaches to learning might help shape quality distance
learning programmes. Salmon sets out a five-stage model that provides a „scaffold‟ for a
structured and paced programme of e-tivities. E-tivities is the name Salmon gives for the
online activities that both the tutor and students participate in which the author claims result
in a more meaningful and empowering learning where the “participant can become
responsible for their own learning and that of their group” (Salmon, p. 33). Although
information technology lends itself to this form of education it could be unwise to view this
technology as the answer to all the problems inherent in distance or blended learning
courses. In a booklet titled „Tutoring Online: Using CMC to Support Learning‟, the Open
University counsels that “just because CMC (Computer-Mediated Communication) exists
does not mean that it must be used for every purpose. There may well be times when other,
more traditional, media would work better” (Phillips et al, 2000: 12).
Research Methodology
The research is inductive and exploratory; data for qualitative analysis is collected from a
purposive and convenient sample of CMS students and practitioners. The aim is to identify
problems rather than provide solutions (Brassington & Pettitt: 2003: 216) and to gain insight.
This primary source of data will be analysed alongside secondary data on the market
potential for CMS courses.
Four different sets of self-completion questionnaires (Fink, 1995) were designed and
administered via email to four different groups of preselected respondents; each
questionnaire was designed for the particular respondent group and each respondent group
representing an area for investigation. Naturally, in preselecting respondents an element of
bias was introduced into the research. However, Brassington and Pettitt (2008) describe this
form of preselection as „judgemental sampling‟ and state that an advantage of this form of
preselection is that the respondents have been chosen because they were “felt to represent
better sources of the required information” (2008: 245). The questions were open-ended
(Brassington & Pettitt) so that the respondents could answer as they saw fit.
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For reasons of the geographic locations of the respondents and their busy and often highly
mobile professional lives it was felt that emailing the questionnaires to the respondents was
the most achievable form of acquiring information. Such research methodological design
might justifiably be open to the criticism that the questionnaire was designed to suit the
adopted research method (Brassington & Pettitt, 2008: 247).
The first group consists of individuals who were chosen for their long experience within the
wider events industry, or their position within an organisation in the industry. The questions
set were slightly altered in the light of each of the respondent‟s unique perspective and
position within the events industry. Five questionnaires were sent out and four responses
were received.
The second group were senior managers within CSM organisations, chosen to gain an
insight into their organisations‟ training and education requirements. These respondents
were graduates of the FdA CSM and some presently undertake, or have undertaken,
teaching duties on the FdA CSM programme. Seven questionnaires were sent out and five
responses received.
The third group of respondents were graduates of the FdA CSM programme, chosen to
provide their reflection and insight into the programme, its delivery and the access to
education it had provided. A pilot questionnaire was sent to three graduates, and this was
developed into the final version which was sent out to sixteen graduates; eight responses
were received.
The fourth group of respondents were all current students on the FdA CSM and included a
large number of overseas students, thus providing an opportunity for examination of issues
encountered with distance learning, studying in a second language and within a UK centric
programme. This helped gain insight into the thoughts and motivations of the current
students, particularly those who were unable to attend a number of the workshops. The
respondents were a mixed group of 1st and 2nd year students. Ten questionnaires were sent
out and seven responses were received. All respondents attended workshops.
The secondary data and „desk top‟ (Housden, 2008) research included much exploratory
analysis of available sources of information, such as; market intelligence, trade organisations
and government department reports, with a view of identifying facts and figures and
emergent themes with regard to the size and health of the UK events industry. As the event
industry is an emergent and often fragmented sector of the UK economy, it is highly unlikely
that available data and information will be all encompassing or comprehensive. Bowdin et al
(1999: XV) also found that “definite data are not available, due to the complex nature and
diversity of the industry”. Perhaps the best that can be achieved is a perception of the size
and health of the UK events market and likely market potential for CSM students.
Sources of secondary data and information on the events industry, included: pertinent
reports from the business intelligence sector, the Department of Culture Media and Sport
(DCMS), the Office of National Statistics (ONS), and the various trade organisations, such
as; the Event Industry Alliance (EIA), the Association of Conference and Exhibition (ACE),
Concert Promoters Association (CPO), and the Association of Festivals Organisers (AFO).
This study also made use of; data gleaned from reports on the numbers of Licence and
Temporary Event Notices applications, data on the numbers of attendees at music events,
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data on the economic impact of various sectors of the events industry, such as; live music
and performing arts, exhibitions, conferences and sports. Drawing from this literature, the
study attempts to derive figures for the number of events held within the various sectors of
the industry, some possible figure for attendance numbers, and market potential in terms of
some estimated number of trained event stewards and crowd safety managers.
The researcher acknowledges that the data sets used were incomplete because of;
timescale over which the research was conducted, the focus of the research on a particular
segment of the UK events market, and others. Within these limitations, the researcher drew
together what information and data existed from four key sectors: Festivals, arenas, football
stadia, and music and entertainment venues.
Assessing the scale of the UK events market and the size of the UK audience hosting
capacity proved to be very complex. Because of the exploratory nature of this study, the
researcher acknowledges that the adopted methodology, the assumptions made in the
analysis, and the findings may all be open to criticism. However, in the absence of alternative
options the researcher was compelled to utilise prior learning and experience in exercising
judgements on a number of occasions.
Findings
As the event and crowd safety management industry is largely a practitioner led sector, the
views and opinions of leading figures within the sector are of primary importance to this
research and have therefore been sought. This research was based in the first instance on
responses to questions set by the researcher and emailed to respondents. As each
respondent holds a significant position within the events and crowd management industry,
the researcher feels that their responses represent a valid view of the thoughts and concerns
of the UK crowd management industry in 2010. A number of themes emerged from these
responses.
Growth of events
Three respondents stated that in their opinion there had been a growth in the number of
events and an increase in their size and. One respondent was of the opinion that an area of
particular note was the “marked increase in the number of outdoor events in the last ten
years”. Three respondents felt that there had been a widening of the type of events being
held and that there are now more parades, carnival and multi day festival events.
Increased professionalisation
Respondents generally believed that events have become more professionalised in recent
years; three respondents saw legal issues as the drivers for the development of new industry
initiatives. All respondents thought there were now more event specific education and
training programmes; a respondent commented that the “last 5 years has seen a dramatic
upswing in the quality and level of training”. On the subject of specialised event and crowd
management related education and training, the respondents concurred that there was a
need for both vocational and academic input into these programmes; one respondent
attributed the change in industry attitudes in favour of crowd management education to the
Roskilde crowd disaster in 2000.
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High UK safety standard
Not all respondents had formal links with international event organisations but on the topic of
event safety standards abroad, one respondent stated that overseas practices had shocked
his organisation‟s members. Another respondent felt that the UK has the highest standards
of event safety and that this should be capitalised upon.
Demand for CSM distance learning programmes
Respondents had little knowledge of the existence of any events education or training
programmes outside of UK. However, one respondent viewed Germany to have a high
quality of events industry education. Respondents also felt that quality distance learning
courses would open up access to education for events professionals and be taken up by
workers and companies within the events sector. Such programmes, respondents
elaborated, would prove attractive to events industry professionals; three respondents felt
that issues of flexibility, course design, IT and multimedia resource were key components in
the success of these programmes. Some respondents affirmed that distance learning
education provision would be attractive to employers. However, one respondent stated that
while distance learning was suitable to education type programmes; it was not suitable for
training type programme.
Demand for crowd management education from outside the UK.
Respondents noted that there was a lack of credible crowd management courses around the
world and that there could be significant demand for such education programmes. One
respondent stated that he would like to see less commercial interests and a more altruistic
approach to the FdA CSM, whilst another saw content and outcome as the most important
factors. Other respondents also viewed content suitability and relevance to the contemporary
and global event industry as key issues.
Drivers to educate industry employees
All respondents perceived a general need for crowd management education within the
events industry. A respondent noted: “There is now a clear perception by all stakeholders in
the industry that crowd management skills must be developed from an educational
perspective assisted by work place experience”. Another respondent called for different
levels of training and education in CSM from basic level 2 stewarding type qualifications to
level 4, 5, 6 qualifications in crowd safety management. Respondents also felt that the
organisations they work for required a crowd management education provision for staff; their
perceived percentage staff requirement ranged from 5% to 99% of the workforce. Higher
level 4, 5 and 6 education requirement attracted responses which varied from 2% of the
entire workforce to 100% of all supervisors, and to 50% of all full time employees.
Furthermore, respondents saw legislation, civil law suits, industry standards and client
demands as the main drivers. Other drivers mentioned include staff desire for self and career
development and also company ethos.
Suitability, accessibility, and pedagogy of CMS courses
The respondents were generally positive about the course syllabus, describing it as pertinent
and extensive. One respondent however felt that whilst the overall syllabus is generally good
it requires reviewing and that a third year of study is required for graduates of the FdA CSM
programme. The workshops were considered to be of the right duration but that some
workshops were more of interest than others. One respondent stated that the UK academic
year being unsuitable for students in the Southern Hemisphere. Tutors and speakers
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generated comments from two respondents on the issue of commercial interest becoming
apparent within some workshop sessions. The Assessment system was felt by all to be
unsatisfactory; comments included the issue of deadline extensions and slow feedback
responses. The objectivity of the marking was considered by one respondent to be
questionable. The quality of Information and communication had both positive and negative
responses. Positive aspects included the communication with teaching staff, whereas
negative aspects revolved around perceived lack of information to assist with passing the
module assignments.
The online resources (Blackboard) produced some varied comments; from desiring to be
able to have career long access to the system, to the limited usefulness of the audio files and
frustration with the quality of these files. The respondents‟ experiences with University staff
were generally positive but the administration of assignment submissions and finances was a
cause of frustration, as was the poor state of the workshop venue in 2007/09. With regard to
whether the graduates felt they had developed academically or that the FdA CSM had been
of benefit to their career, all responses were very positive and saw the qualification as
opening up new business opportunities; also that they gained confidence through the study
and obtaining the qualification.
Course accessibility.
On the subject of how Bucks New University could make the course more accessible, the
overseas respondents felt that shifting some of the focus from English legal and working
practice to incorporate other cultures‟ working practices and experience would increase the
attractiveness of the course. Interestingly one respondent suggested that entry level
requirements for the course should be raised and that the course made more challenging by,
for example, better integration of areas such as crowd psychology into the programme.
Distance learning (VLE) versus workshop attendance
The respondents who attended the workshops considered their employment roles as the
single biggest factor that influenced their attendance. These respondents stated that one of
the advantages of attending the workshops was developing relationships with both their
peers and the module tutors. The negative factors regarding attendance seem to concern the
location of the students in relation to the university and the associated time and cost. Three
respondents considered Blackboard as being a primary and „vital‟ study resource and two
respondents had used the audio files of lectures provided through the university‟s Virtual
Learning Environment. In contrast, a respondent experienced considerable problems with
access to Blackboard and the timely arrival of support and information.
In terms of the improvements that Bucks New University might consider, respondents
suggested a mixture of video conferencing or podcasting workshop days, improving sound
quality of audio files and blackboard access, and better use of the peer to peer learning
opportunities afforded by the forum facilities in Blackboard. One respondent stated that for
him a key improvement would have been the ability to interact with the tutor about the
assignment brief in a timely fashion. The need for the development of better learning
resources for distance learners was seen as important by three respondents; one respondent
also saw a need for the crowd safety industry to discuss and communicate ideas. All
respondents felt that better distance learning resources would attract new students to the
university.
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Additional comments included one respondent based in Australia who felt that the FdA CSM
syllabus needs to address the issue of local laws and regulations to attract serving police
officers to the course. Another respondent called for a third year of study so that the FdA can
be „topped up‟ into a BA (Hons). Yet, another thought that the university is failing to make
venues and the wider industry fully aware of the FdA in Crowd Safety Management.
All respondents found interactions with tutors and peers aided their learning. They, however,
were frustrated with early finishing on the second workshop day. A few respondents seemed
to want more content, and a few mentioned the poor quality and low academic standard of
the presentations
All the respondents who were not able to attend workshops made use of the Virtual Learning
Environment (Blackboard), where reading material, audio files and other new media
resources were available. Respondents found the posted material useful and interesting.
One respondent did not use the audio files because he had difficulty with understanding the
tutors‟ spoken English. Respondents also made a wide array of suggestions on what the
university could do to improve the distance learning materials and support. One respondent
suggested that a document search function would be useful as would a 24 hour help line;
another felt live web streaming of workshops might be useful. Other comments included
better use of forums and better presentation of documents in an appropriate academic style.
Almost all the respondent thought that better online resources would attract a new profile of
distance learners.
Conclusion
This exploratory study was set out to ascertain whether there was a demand within the
Crowd Management industry for the development of further CSM courses, particularly,
distance learning education programmes. A number of themes emerged characterising the
market for CSM which have implications for the provision of educational courses. The
findings suggest that there is a noticeable growth of events, and increased
professionalisation which point to the need for CSM skills and better provision of distance
learning education. There are also indications for a growing demand for crowd management
education from outside the UK, driven by a perceived high UK safety standard, and quality
CSM distance learning programmes.
The findings also suggest that whilst the events industry is not immune to the economic
downturn, factors such as legislation, civil lawsuits and industry demands contribute to
fostering a favourable climate for CSM education. Another important finding is the apparent
desire amongst past and present students of the FdA CSM to undertake education
programmes in CSM. Reduced costs associated with workshop based study programme in
conjunction with a more flexible programme of study are seen as attractive to both employers
and students. However the research picked up a clear concern that distance learning could
cause a loss of peer to peer learning and relationship development; therefore the design and
delivery of any distance learning programme may need to respond to these and other
associated concerns. Furthermore, whilst some respondents made good use of distance
learning resources such as the audio files, others either did not or were deterred by the poor
sound quality of presentations. These issues of concern require further research.
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References
Au S, Ryan M, Cary M, Whalley S (1993). Managing Crowd Safety in Public Venues: A study
to generate guidance for venue owners and enforcing authority Inspectors. Norwich UK: HSE
books.
Boud D, Garrick J, (1999). Understanding Learning a Work. London: Routledge.
Bowdin G, McDonnell I, Allen J, O‟Toole W (1999). Events Management. Oxford:
Butterworth-Heinemann.
Brassington F, Pettitt S (2003). Principles Of Marketing, 3rd edition. Harlow UK: Prentice Hall.
Brownhill B (1998). Life Long Learning in The age of learning, education and the knowledge
society.
Department of Culture Media and Sport (2008). The Guide To Safety At Sports Grounds, 5th
edition. London: TSO Books.
Farmer P, Mulrooney A and Ammin Jr R. 1996. Sport Facility Planning and Management.
Morgantown WV USA: Fitness Information Technology Inc.
Fink A (1995) How to design surveys: The Survey Kit 5, Thousand Oaks, CA USA: Sage
Publishing.
Frosdick and Walley (1997). Sports and Safety Management. Oxford: Butterworth
Heinemann.
Fruin J (1971). Pedestrian and Planning Design. Mobile Alabama USA: Elevator World Inc.
Getz D (1997). Event Management and Event Tourism. New York USA: Cognizant
Communications Corporation.
Grainger-Jones O (2008). Facilitating The Learning Of Adult Distance Learners. Unpublished
paper written as part requirement for the Certificate in Learning and Teaching in Higher
Education.
Health and Safety Executive (1999). The Event Safety Guide. Norwich UK: HSE Books.
Health and Safety Executive (2000). Managing Crowds Safely. Norwich UK: HSE Books.
Housden M (2008). Marketing Research and Information. Oxford UK: The Chartered
Institute Of Marketing. Butterworth-Heinemann.
Jarvis (2001). The Age Of Learning. London: Kogan Page.
Kemp C and Hill I (2004). Health & Safety Aspects At Live Events. Cambridge: Entertainment
Technology Press.
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Kemp C, Hill I, Upton M (2004). A Comparative Study Of Two Major Music Events.
Kemp C, Hill I, Hamilton M, Upton M (2007) Case Studies In Crowd Management.
Knowles M (1973). The Adult Learner. Houston, USA: Gulf Publishing.
Maslow, A (1948) Motivation and personality. New York: Harper and Row New York.
Philips M, Lunsford J, Hawkins R, Gilmartin K (2000). Tutoring Online: Using CMC To
Support Learning. Milton Keynes UK: Open University.
Rovai A (2004). A constructivist approach to online college learning. Elsevier. UK: Published
in Internet and Higher Education 7.
Ramsden P (2003). Learning To Teach In Higher Education, 2nd Edition. London: Routledge
Falmer.
Salmon G (2006). e-tivities -The Key To Active Online Learning. London: RoutledgeFalmer.
Shone A, Parry B (2001). Successful Event Management. London: Continuum. ISBN 0-82645219-9.
Still K (2000). Crowd Dynamics. PhD paper available online at
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Yeoman I, Robertson M, Ali-Knight J, Drummond S, McMahon- Beattie U (2004). Festival
and Events Management, an international arts and culture perspective, Oxford UK:
Butterworth-Heinemann.
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6 REVIEW OF PEDESTRIAN AND EVACUATION SIMULATIONS
Professor G. Keith Still
August 2011
Abstract
Simulating emergency evacuations has grown in popularity since the tragic events of
th
September 11 . Unfortunately there are a large number of modeling, simulation, animation
and computer graphics systems available today – many of which are misleading. Models and
simulations fall into two main categories: Microscopic and macroscopic. I highlight the general
differences in these approaches outlining the strengths and weaknesses in both approaches. I
examine the fundamental principles of pedestrian and evacuation simulations in this paper and
guide the reader towards a greater understanding of crowd dynamics and evacuation analysis.
A background to modeling and simulations, their purpose and objectives followed by a risk
assessment analysis description is presented. I highlight the different types of evacuation
scenario that need consideration in choosing a modeling/simulation tool and conclude with a
checklist for choosing an evacuation analysis system.
Keywords: Crowd dynamics, crowd safety, evacuation analysis, pedestrian simulation, risk
assessment, behavioural based safety
Introduction
Modeling evacuation from complex spaces involves a large number of variables, many of
which are unknown and potentially unknowable. How a crowd reacts to an incident is not
something that can be easily tested as the nature of an evacuation, and its consequences,
are impossible to replicate under controlled conditions without endangering the test subjects
(Galea, year; Galea, year; Paulsen, Soma, Schneider, Wilklund, & Lovas, 1995; Thompson
& Marchant, 1993, 1995a, 1995b; Ketchell, Cole, …, …, 1993). However, we can learn from
past events (Canter, 1980; www.crowddynamics.com/main/crowddisasters.html) study the
things that work and those that fail, improve process and understanding – but planning for
the unforeseen (such as the tragic events of 9/11) remains an oxymoron. Simulations help us
explore the boundary conditions of a problem. For example the best possible time would it
take to evacuate X people from Y floors of a multi-story building (Pauls, 1987, 1988; Author,
2001; Author, 2001; Schreckenberg & Sharma, 2001). But evacuation is highly dependant on
crowd behavior, communication systems and the nature of the threat, the alert status (which
can create over-reaction or the opposite, complacency) and many other variables. Extreme
caution is advised on taking the results of a simulation as an absolute safe egress value [15,
16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22].
Models and simulations should be considered to have two main purposes: either proof/failure
of some theoretical value, or to provide some insight to potential problems. Clearly there is a
requirement for simulating an emergency evacuation of the built and complex environment.
The egress time is a critical factor in understanding and applying the appropriate evacuation
strategy. In general evacuation simulations can be used to explore potential failures in our
planning for an emergency or issues that may arise during egress. However, this requires
basic and fundamental understanding of the elements of behavioral based safety to be used
with any confidence [23, 24].
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Modelling techniques
The two main categories of modeling techniques are defined as microscopic and
macroscopic [25]. Microscopic modeling used some computer simulated agents capable of
decision making in a model of the built or complex environment we wish to test. Macroscopic
models include the building codes, general flow and distance calculations and available
egress widths demonstrating compliance to the building codes. A two stage process should
be employed in the process of modeling an evacuation. Begin with the macroscopic process
– evaluate the travel distances and route capacity. Should questions arise from this analysis
then change resolution to the microscopic level of analysis. Use the process of modeling to
gain insight to the nature of the problem – a simple example is to run a shortest path test.
Take a map or plan of an area and test a number of initial starting positions. Draw a graph of
the travel distance against the occupancy levels. How many people may arrive at the same
time, to any specific exit, can tell you a lot about the success of an evacuation of a place of
public assembly.
The claims of many vendors to “model the range of human behavior” can sound convincing
however, in our extensive experience, elements that affect the human behavior such as way
finding, demographics, public address and communication systems, dominant personalities
(such as a police officer), state of alertness (the evacuation behavior pre- post- 9/11 is very
different in tall buildings) can all change the evacuation timings and are not easily modeled.
To cut through this maze of conflicting and confusing variables our first criteria for evaluating
a modeling system is the vendor‟s claim. It is very easy to read the papers written on a
modeling technique and these should be readily available. Conference proceedings such as
“Human Behavior in Fires” [12, 13], “Pedestrian and Evacuation Dynamics” [14, 15] outline
various modeling techniques and provide a good cross reference for the specific simulation.
Validation of the vendors claim, third party validation and refereed publication separate most
of the problems of good/bad simulations currently available. An honest vendor will state their
claims clearly and in an easy to understand manner. Beware the “snake oil” pitch of a
software vendor and always seek third party validation. Simulating emergency evacuation is
a matter of life or death and the garbage in/garbage out principles, fundamental to all
computer simulations, should not be underestimated.
Good crowd simulation modelling: Some considerations
Egress time
Evacuation is a two stage process and this must be defined in any model and/or simulation.
The two stages are “reaction time” and “evacuation time”. The former of these is the time it
takes the crowd to „start to move‟. Clearly if the reaction time is the second the alarm is
raised then the evacuation time is a function of the various egress route capacities and travel
distances. However, if the building occupants take time to start to move then the evacuation
time will be a function of both the reaction time and the travel distance/route capacity. Sime
[26] ran a series of tests on the Tyne and Wear Transport system; his results are show in
table 1.
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Evacuation Time to start to move
Test
Concourse Bottom
Escalator
1
08:15
09:00
Bell Only
2
Staff
3
P.A.
4
Staff
P.A.+
5
P.A.++
02:15
03:00
01:15
07:40
01:15
01:30
Time
to Appropriateness
clear
of behavior
the station
14:47
Delayed
or
no
evacuation, not all the
people leave
08:00
Users
directed
to
concourse
10:30
Users stood at bottom
escalator
06:45
Users evacuated
01:30
01:00
05:45
+
Users evacuated by trains
and exits
Table 1. Results from the Sime evacuation analysis
To summarise his research, the reaction of the crowd, the time to start to move, is highly
dependant on the crowd communication system. Most modeling software, simulations and
evacuation analysis ignore this important element of behavioral based safety. It is how the
crowd reacts to the change in the environment coupled with the information system that can
dramatically change the evacuation timings. The different timings above are a matter of
perception, following the events of May 11th where many of the building occupants were
alerted via blackberry communication systems it was noted that several minutes delay could
be added to the above while the message to evacuate propagates through the
networks.Clearly evacuation modeling that is travel distance and capacity based has severe
limitations in assessing the actual egress time. So one of our first elements to our checklist
for a good simulation is the reaction time – does this simulation allow me to test variable
initial reaction times?
Egress instructions
Simple instructions, delivered in a clear and concise manner have a dramatic effect on the
evacuation process and, again this is often ignored in modeling and simulation of emergency
egress. An example of this critical element in modeling evacuation is illustrated in another of
Sime‟s [27] research projects (see table 2).
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Lecture % using route
Theatre Entrance Fire
Exit
F
55
45
R
0
100
F
62
38
R
30
70
Instructions from lecturer
To leave the room (exit
unspecified)
To leave the room via the fire
exit only
unspecified)
unspecified)
Table 2. Results from the Sime‟s theatre evacuation analysis
The aim of the study was to examine the effects of exit position on the exit chosen and time
to evacuate. To do this the simultaneous evacuation of two lecture theatres on the ground
floor of a building in Portsmouth Polytechnic was monitored. The "front" (F) lecture theatre
had its entrance and fire exit in both back corners. The "rear" (R) lecture theatre had the
entrance at one corner at the back and fire exit in a corner at the front.
In the F theatre the lecturer decided not to tell his "audience" which exit to leave by. A
statistical analysis was conducted on the possible relationship between seat position, travel
distance moved, exit used and time taken to leave in the F theatre. Observers at each exit
recorded frequencies and evacuation times and gave out a questionnaire to each evacuee,
which was used to supplement the other data. Of 56 people in the F theatre 55% left by the
entrance, 45% by the fire exit. Sime [27]
As the above experiment demonstrates, empathy or authority announcements can
dramatically alter the evacuation time in places of public assembly and, again, this element is
often ignored in a simulation of emergency egress. During a security alert at the Birmingham
Arena the staff had to call an evacuation. The demographics of the crowd (at a rave – a
dance event) were youths ages 18 – 24. Initially, the security staff made an announcement
using the venue public address system to evacuate the area immediately.
As you may expect the crowd did not react to this announcement. A few minutes later the DJ
made an announcement that began the evacuation process; same message but the
difference was using an empathy figure instead of an authority figure to deliver the message.
How the message is delivered is vital to reducing the „start to move‟ time.
Boundary conditions
Modeling and simulation help us understand the lower limits (fastest possible time) and the
user is advised to restricted modeling and simulation to the analysis of travel distance,
availability and location of exits with respect to the general population, and direction and
capacity for optimal egress. We call this process a „spatio-temporal analysis‟ in which the
boundary conditions are explored [28, 29, 30] To illustrate this, given a specific occupancy
limit and a number of exits, how long would it take for the occupants to reach a place of
safety. We can test some or all of the available exits under a range of initial start to move
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assumptions and explore the environment. One project, for an international bank, involves 4
stairwells in a 32 story building. We used a commercial simulation to test the what-if
scenarios of all exits available and all combinations of 1, 2 or 3 exits (16 tests in total). This
uncovered a problem at the South-East exit in which the security system would create a
bottleneck if the occupants had to all leave by this exit. Modeling egress using different
scenarios under the same assumptions (zero reaction time, all occupants to the same exit)
allows the user to explore the potential problems. This application of modeling is firmly in the
„insight‟ domain as it throws up a potential problem in relative terms and not as an „absolute‟
egress time. As we have illustrated absolute egress times need to be treated with the
appropriate understanding of the evacuation process and communication system deployed
[31, 32].
Behavioral based safety
Modeling human behavior is, as we have stated above, a complex business and there are
many unknown variables, such as, the communication message and delivery [33, 34]. This
can have a dramatic affect on the egress rate and we need to include this in our analysis to
understand emergency behavior and the evacuation time. Where the simulations are useful
are in defining the lower (best) evacuation. We can simulate to define the lower boundary
conditions [35, 36, 37], this may prove useful in defining building code compliance and our
simulation process begins to take shape as providing „insight‟. We can digitize and
environment, measure the travel distances, calculate the capacity using the narrowest point
along the route limits and estimate using both a rough cut capacity analysis of flow and
density (see table 3) and estimating the additional start to move time depending on our
communication systems and methods.
LoS
LoS A
LoS B
LoS C
LoS D
LoS E
LoS F
Density
Space
(ped/m2)
(m2/ped)
< 0.27
0.43 to
0.31
0.72 to
0.43
1.08 to
0.72
2.17 to
1.08
> 2.17
> 3.24
2.32 to
3.24
1.39 to
2.32
0.93 to
1.39
0.46 to
1.39
< 0.46
Space
Flow Rate
Flow Rate
(ft2/ped) (ped/min/m) (ped/min/ft)
> 35
< 23
<7
25 to
23 to 33
7 to 10
35
15 to
33 to 49
10 to 15
25
10 to
49 to 66
13 to 20
15
66 to 82
20 to 25
5 to 10
variable
variable
<5
Av.
Speed
(m/s)
> 1.3
1.27
Av.
Speed
(ft/min)
260
250
1.22
240
1.14
225
0.76
150
< 0.76
< 150
Table 3. Highways Capacity Data – the speed/density/flow relationships [38
At a fundamental level the travel distance is just one function of egress time and, in that
respect, capable of modeling and design optimization. Modeling techniques that are based
on the travel distance and involve assessing the capacity of routes and optimization of the
egress rates serve our general evacuation needs very well – but do NOT provide the actual
time to egress and hence we should NOT treat these as absolute values.
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For example, how a crowd may react to a specific event (such as the Cessna incident on
May 11th in Washington DC) can depend on the time of day, nature of the information
(blackberry information and rate of communication – reports of several minutes delay to
transmit, receive, understanding, time to react) all add significantly to the overall evacuation
time [39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44].
One element of evacuation is the „cry wolf‟ element too many false alarms and the effective
evacuation time would increase for the next evacuation alert. Again this element of
evacuation simulation is often neglected with obvious consequences.
Scenario planning
Prior to 9/11, the majority of evacuation considerations were jokingly referred to as the
GTFOT principle. In the event of an emergency (typically a fire) then the occupants were
advised to Get Out of The building as quickly as possible. Sadly human behavior in fire is
often complex and confusing. Given that the rate of the incident may develop in seconds the
initial reaction time is critical to life safety. Post 9/11, we need to take into consideration the
possibility of chemical, biological or nuclear/radiological threats. This leads to a very different
type of scenario planning and one in which modeling and simulation can serve a useful
purpose. There are four main categories of evacuation which can be served by a variety of
the modeling/simulation/animation techniques.
Total
This is the process in which all occupants leave by the nearest available exit and assemble
at a place of safety. We need to consider the location of a place of safety as, unlike fire,
simply being away from the threat is a function of the nature of the threat. The assembly
points may be in a danger zone in the event of a bomb threat.
Directed
This is the range of scenarios in which it becomes necessary to evacuate a building or place
of public assembly in a specific direction. So again assessing the place of safety, this may be
a cordon, a range away from a threatened area or upwind from some contaminant (natural or
terrorist activity).
Phased
The problems of internal contamination, such as anthrax, in which most of the building can
be evacuated but certain areas need to be contained until decontamination procedures are
implemented. Also in the event of fire in tall buildings the floors immediately above and below
the seat of the fire will be evacuated BEFORE the other floors. This is the typical process
and procedures where sufficient fire suppressing systems are functional. The policy of
phased evacuation has come under criticism as; again, human behavior and therefore
behavioral based safety may conflict with the building design, operation and evacuation
strategy.
Stay Put
Events during the bombing in London from the IRA have demonstrated, in numerous cases,
that the policy of “stay put” can be very effective in life preservation. The building can absorb
the blast while the occupants are contained in a place of relative safety inside the structure.
Consider a simple thought experiment in the recent Cessna incident (May 11th). Were the
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building occupants at greater risk running through the streets or within the building? Clearly
this depends on what payload the plane was carrying and its intended target. To consider an
effective evacuation strategy you must model the risk assessment to the people.
Risk assessment for places of public assembly
There are a number of risk assessment techniques available and we have a selection of
these on our website [45]. The basic principle is to create a table of the likelihood against the
consequences. We illustrate this below (table 4).
Likelihood
Almost Certain
Likely
Possible
Unlikely
Rare
Minor
Moderate
Tolerable
Tolerable
Trivial
Trivial
Consequence
Medium
Major
Critical
Substantial Substantial Intolerable
Moderate Substantial Substantial
Tolerable
Moderate Substantial
Tolerable
Tolerable
Moderate
Trivial
Tolerable
Tolerable
Extreme
Intolerable
Intolerable
Substantial
Substantial
Moderate
Table 4 – Risk Analysis Matrix (Likelihood vs Consequences)
Using a matrix for risk assessment
Risk assessment for an evacuation can be assessed considering the target and the payload
of a small aircraft – therefore if the target was people and the people were on the streets
then the consequences would be extreme. This is a simple application of a game theory
model to assess relative risk and develop a strategy that is appropriate for the scenarios. By
comparison of the numerical values of likelihood and consequences we can develop a site
specific threat scenario analysis and appropriate evacuation strategy (see table 5). We use a
colour coded method to make these tables easier to read – you can download the excel
spreadsheet from the website (www.crowddynamics.com).
Level of Risk
1
2
3
4
5
Defined
Trivial
Tolerable
Moderate
Substantial
Intolerable
Table 5 – Level of Risk - Numerical definitions
Each threat scenario, likelihood against consequences, and tabulated provides a relative
measure of threat/risk assessment. To expand on this theme we can assign actions to the
various threat levels as follows (table 6):
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Threat level
Trivial
Tolerable
Moderate
Substantial
Intolerable
Action
No further action and no record required
A risk that has been reduced to a level that can be endured
The risk needs to be evaluated carefully and reduced to being a
„tolerable risk'
A high level of monitoring and record keeping will be required, until the
risk is reduced or eliminated
This level is not acceptable and change is required until the risk has
been reduced to one of the above
Table 6 – Risk Action Planning Matrix
Finally we can apply an action list to the above and develop an approach to both modeling
the threat and developing a strategy.
Elimination of the risk (if possible). Specialists should possibly be used to carry out
assessment profiles and suggest risk reduction methods. This would include security and
screening processes to eliminate the potential of a security alert (bomb threat).
Reducing the risk (if possible)., Organizations should adopt processes to suit the situation or
circumstances, take protective measures that cater for everyone in the area, improve
controls and procedures, manage the care and safety of the occupants and maintain
procedures to the required standards. Fortification falls into this category of risk mitigation.
Manage the risk. If risks cannot be eliminated or reduced sufficiently, personnel need to be
deployed to minimise the risk. During evacuation the deployment of security staff,
assignment and designation of places of safe assembly can be a dynamic process and
effective crowd management is often the practical solution.
Planning around the risk. Emergency procedures should be explained and practiced so that
everybody knows what to do. Alarm systems and indicators should be thoroughly tested on a
regular basis and should take into account any special needs, noisy environments, and
others.
Conclusions
Presently, there is a growing concern about the use of modeling and simulation. We have
been running education and awareness, training and application workshops around the world
for the last decade and the problems of misuse, misunderstanding and „snake-oil‟
salesmanship are all too common. In life critical application we need to be cautious of
computer simulation and their limitations. We can make the following general observations
about the simulation approach to decision making.
1.
Simulation is most appropriate when the problem is too complex or difficult to solve
using another method.
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2.
A model must be developed to represent the various relationships existing in the
problem situation.
3.
A process such as random-number procedures must be employed to generate values
for the probabilistic components of the model.
4.
A bookkeeping procedure must be developed to keep track of what is happening in
the simulation process.
5.
The simulation process must be conducted for many periods in order to establish the
long-run averages for the decision alternatives or other changes in the system.
Ergodic analysis (long term averages) should be the purpose of the simulation
system.
6.
Local transient effects can skew simulation results - as can bad model building - it is
essential that simulation builders be scrutinised in the same way one would scrutinise
the simulation system.
7.
A decision support simulation needs to be validated and open to scrutiny. Good third
party validation is essential to be confident of any simulation system.
To summarize the situation, you should go through the following checklist with the vendor
(and consultant) who proposes a simulation system for evacuation strategies.
What third party validation do you offer?
Is this a black-box or an open source model?
How long does it take to build a model?
How can we test/validate the underlying assumptions in the model?
How brittle is the model - if I make a small change to my basic assumptions how long
does it take to change the model?
What is the cost of building and modifying a model – both in time to change and
training required to make these changes?
The potential user of pedestrian or evacuation model should also pay specific attention to the
appropriateness of the model to the application. For example, an agent based model with
multiple parameters is probably not the best way to model 100,000 people in a mass
gathering. Similarly, a flow model (macroscopic) is not going to provide accurate results for a
complex space involving many turns and congestion points.
These questions are easily answered by asking the vendor specific questions relating to
previous use and applications of their software, tools, models or simulations. Ask about
validation; ask about the safety factors built into their models and the types of outputs. If the
system produces a single value as an output (say 8 ½ minutes for evacuation) rather than a
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mean time with a standard distribution and a statement about the assumptions used, then be
suspicious of the models quality. Ask about the assumptions built into the „start to move‟
process and how that affects the overall results. If you are not satisfied with the answers to
the above questions then - caveat emptor – buyer beware. In general good simulation
systems follow four simple principles: simple to build, simple to modify, simple to understand,
and simple to communicate its output. At all times a model should adhere to the BATNEEC
principle – best available technology not entailing excessive cost.
References
[1] Galea E.R. Use of mathematical modeling in fire safety engineering, Paper No 97/IM/25.
CMS Press. The Fire Safety Engineering group. Centre for Numerical Modelling and Process
Analysis, University of Greenwich. Wellington Street. London SE18 6PF.
[2] Galea E.R. The numerical simulation of aircraft evacuation and it's application to aircraft
design and certification. Paper No. 97/IM/28. CMS Press. The Fire Safety Engineering group.
Centre for Numerical Modelling and Process Analysis, University of Greenwich. Wellington
Street. London SE18 6PF.
[3] Paulsen, T with Soma, H., Schneider, V. Wilklund, J. and Lovas, G. Evaluation of
simulation models of evacuation from complex spaces. SINTEF Report STf75 A95020 June
1995 (ISBN 82-595-8583-9)
[4] Thompson, P. Marchant. EW. Modelling Techniques for Evacuation. Engineering for
Crowd Safety (Ed Smith RA, Dickie J) Elsevier. (1993) ISBN 0 444 899200.
[5] Thompson,P.A. and Marchant,E.W. (1995a) A Computer Model the Evacuation of Large
Building Populations. Fire Safety Journal 24, pp. 131-148.
[6] Thompson,P.A. and Marchant,E.W. (1995b) Testing and Application of the Computer
Model 'SIMULEX'. Fire Safety Journal 24, pp. 149-166.
[7] Ketchell, N, Cole, S. et. al. The EGRESS code for human movement and behaviour in
emergency evacuations in Engineering for Crowd Safety 1993 Elsevier. (Ed Smith RA, Dickie
J) ISBN 0 444 899200.
[8] Canter (Editor). (1980) Fires and human behavior. ISBN 1-85346-105-9
[9] www.crowddynamics.com/main/crowddisasters.html list of recent crowd disasters from
around the world.
[10] Pauls, J. Calculating Evacuation Times for Tall Buildings. Fire Safety Journal 12 (1987).
National Council of Canada and BUSI Building Safety Institute.
[11] Pauls, J. Movement of People. SFPE Handbook of fire Protection Engineering. (1988).
National Council of Canada and BUSI Building Safety Institute.
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[12] Proceedings from the 2nd International Symposium on Human Behavior in Fire –
Understanding Human Behavior for better Fire Safety Design. (2001) ISBN 0953231267
[13] Proceedings from the 3rd International Symposium on Human Behavior in Fire – Public
Fire Safety – Professionals in Partnership. (2001) ISBN 09541216-6-X
[14] M. Schreckenberg and S.D. Sharma (Editors). Pedestrian and Evacuation Dynamics.
(2001). ISBN 3-540-42690-6
[15] E.R. Galea (Editor). Pedestrian and Evacuation Dynamics. (2003). ISBN 1904521088
[16] Melinek. SJ, Booth, S. An analysis of evacuation times and the movement of crowds in
buildings. Fire Research Station. CP 96/75 (1975).
[17] Still G. K. New Computer system can predict human behaviour response to building
fires. Fire 84 (January 1993), 40-41
[18] Still G. K. Towering Inferno New Scientist (Supplement April 1993).
[19] Still G. K. Simulating Egress using Virtual Reality - a perspective view of simulation and
design. IMAS Fire Safety on Ships symposium (May 1994).
[20] Still G. K. New Insights into Crowd Behaviour - It's Fractal. Focus November (1994).
[21] Still G. K. The Secret Life of crowds. Focus (June 1996)
[22] Still G. K. Last word, mind the gap. New Scientist (March 20th 1999).
[23] Still G. K PhD Thesis, Crowd Dynamics, Warwick University 2000
[24] Sime J. Crowd Safety Management and Communications in Disasters. MoSHE. 1992
Available from the Building Research Establishment. Borehamwood or from JSA Research
Consultants, Goldalming, Surrey.
[25] Sarkar, S. (1995) Evaluation of Safety for Pedestrians at Macro- and Microlevels in
Urban Areas, Transportation Research Record 1502, 105-118.
[26] Proulx, G. and Sime, J.D., "To Prevent Panic in an Underground Emergency : Why Not
Tell People the Truth? Fire Safety Science", Proceedings of the Third International
Symposium, Elesevier Applied Science, New York, 1991, pp 843-852.
[27] Kimura M and Sime J D (1989) Exit choice behavior during the evacuation of two lecture
theatres. Presented at the Second International Symposium of the IAFSS (International
Association of Fire Safety Science) 13-17 June 1988. Tokyo, Japan. Fire Safety Science.
Proceedings of the Second International Symposium. Washington DC: Hemisphere
Publishing Corporation.
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[28] Penn, A.Vaughan. L. Pedestrian movement and Spacial Design. Passenger Terminal
(1995). Print available from Bartlett School of Architecture, University College of London.
London. UK. http://www.casa.ucl.ac.uk/
[29] Henderson L. F. The Statistics of Crowd Fluids. Nature 229 (1971) pg 381.
[30] Henderson L. F. Sexual differences in human crowd motion. Nature 240 (1972) pg 252.
[31] Proulx, G. et. al. Evacuation Times and Movement in Office Buildings National Research
Council of Canada, Internal report 711 (1996)
[32] Proulx, G. Review of Evacuation Strategies for Occupants with Disabilities. National
Research Council of Canada. Internal Report 712 (1996)
[33] AlGadhi,S.A.H. and Mahmassani,H.S. Modelling Crowd Behavior And Movement:
Application to Makkah Pilgrimage. Proc. 11th International Symposium on Transportation
and Traffic Theory. M. Koshi(ed.), Yokohama, Japan July 1990. pp 59-78.
[34] AlGadhi,S.A.H. and Mahmassani,H.S. (1991) Simulation Of Crowd Behavior And
Movement: Fundamental Relations And Applications. Transportation Research Record 1320,
pp. 260-268.
[35] Blue, V.J. and Adler, J.L. (2000) Cellular Automata Microsimulation of Bidirectional
Pedestrian Flows. Transportation Research Board 1678,135-141.
[36] Blue, V.J. and Adler, J. L., (1998). Emergent Fundamental Pedestrian Flows From
Cellular Automata Microsimulation, Transportation Research Record 1644, 29-36.
[37] Blue, V.J. and Adler, J.L., (1999) Using Cellular Automata. Microsimulation to Model
Pedestrian Movements. Proceedings of the 14th International Symposium on Transportation
and Traffic Theory, A. Ceder (ed.) Elsevier Science Ltd. July 1999, pp. 235-254
[38] Fruin, J. Pedestrian and Planning Design. Metropolitan Association of Urban Designers
and Environmental Planners.1971. Library of Congress catalogue number 70-159312
(Elevator World Inc. Educational Services Division. PO Box 6507, 354 Morgan Avenue,
Mobile, Alabama 36606))
[39] Okazaki, S (1979) A Study of Pedestrian Movement in Architectural Space, Part 1:
Pedestrian Movement by the Application on of Magnetic Models. Trans. of A.I.J., No.283,
pp.111-119.
[40] Okazaki, S (1979) A Study of Pedestrian Movement in Architectural Space Part 2:
Concentrated Pedestrian Movement. Trans. of A.I.J., No.284, pp. 101-110.
[41] Okazaki, S (1979) A Study of Pedestrian Movement in Architectural Space Part 3: Along
the Shortest Path, Taking Fire, Congestion and Unrecognized Space into Account. Journal of
Architecture, Planning. Environment Engineering. AIJ, No.285, pp. 137-147.
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[42] Okazaki, S and Yamamoto, C. (1981) A Study of Pedestrian Movement in Architectural
Space Part 4: Pedestrian Movement Represented in Perspective. Journal of Architecture,
Planning. Environment Engineering. AIJ, No.299, pp.105-113.
[43] Okazaki, S and Matsushita S. (1981) A Study of Pedestrian Movement in Architectural
Space Part 5: A Probing walk and a guide walk by a guideboard. Journal of Architecture
Planning. Environment Engineering. AIJ, No.302, pp.87-93.
[44] Okazaki, S. and Matsushita, S. (1993) A study of simulation model for pedestrian
movement with evacuation and queuing, Proceeding of the International Conference on
Engineering for Crowd Safety, pp.271-280.
[45] You can download both a spreadsheet risk assessment template and the associated
descriptions from www.crowddynamics.com
About the Author:
Professor Still has a PhD in “Crowd Dynamics” and has developed a wide range of crowd
simulation and modeling techniques for critical infrastructures. Projects include the modeling
of the Haj (annual Pilgrimage to Makkah in Saudi Arabia) and the real-time command and
control system for multi-building, wide area evacuation at Canary Wharf – UK Financial
District. He is a regular visiting speaker at the UK Cabinet Office Emergency Planning
College (Easingwold) where he runs workshops on crowd dynamics and crowd safety in the
build and complex environment. He has provided testimony for the Committee on House
Administration at a televised public hearing (June 9th, 2005) on the “Emergency
Preparedness of the House and the Evacuation of May 11th, 2005”. His website
www.crowddynamics.com is used by academic and industry based researchers around the
world. He can be contacted at Crowd Dynamics Ltd. The Mill House, Staveley Mill Yard,
Staveley, LA8 9LS. UK.
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7 CONCERT PATRON SAFETY
Professor Gil Fried and Dr Andrew Milsten
August 2011
Abstract
Newspapers regularly highlight major concert disasters from the Cocoanut Grove disaster in
1942 to The Station nightclub disaster in 2004 (Perkins, 2004). While these incidents are
sensational and scary and produced dramatic injuries, they are not typical for most concerts.
What are the typical injuries found at concerts? Some might postulate crushing injuries from
crowd surges or muscle-skeletal injuries from mosh pit dancing. Others might argue that heat
exhaustion for summer concerts is the key concern. No matter what claims might be raised,
the risk and types of injuries that might arise and who might be the most susceptible to such
injuries, have been minimally documented. Thus, this article was conceived as a way to try
and analyze real medical reports from a number of concerts in the United States and to
determine what the most likely concert related risks are for patrons. It will first examine some
of the initially documented concert related incidents to determine if there are any patterns. It
will then look at some of the basic thoughts associated with crowd injuries from some initial
studies. The article will also draw on research from 21 concerts with over 340,000 fans to
analyze medical related treatments. It will end with some recommendations on how to make
concerts safer for patrons.
Concert related incidents
There are a number of ways people can be injured at a concert, but most people do not
attend a concert anticipating possibly dying. People can die at concerts from various causes,
such as; crowd surge, accidents, assaults, and even cardiac arrest. Knowing how people
are injured can help create risk reduction strategies. The following represent just a sample of
injuries and deaths over the years.
Death – Crowd surge
Eight children were trampled to deth and at least three adults crushed in a stampede to see
local television celebritieas and beauty queens at a concert in Valencia, Venezuela. At least
60 people were injured when the crowd panicked after police fired warning shots to try and
control the crowd. Thousands of fans had clambered over temporary barricades to enter the
venue and triggered chaos when hundreds of people attempted to force their way into the
already packed venue. Police estimated that 30,000 spectators were trying to squeeze into
the confined space which could not hold 27,000 fans (McGirk, 2001).
The crowd at Germany‟s 2010 Love Parade was expected to be around 800,000 but quickly
rose to 1.4 million. A second venue was opened at the last minute to accommodate the
concert-goers. The crowd was funneled through a single highway underpass to transfer
between venues. Concert security officers became concerned about crowding in the tunnel
and closed it off at one end. Concert-goers were told by bull horn to turn around and go back
the other way. However, those coming from the other side did not know the end was blocked
and fans kept entering the tunnel. Panic ensued due to crowding and fainting and hundreds
were injured trying to scramble out of the tunnel before 19 fans were trampled to death and
400 were injured (Mohr, 2010).
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Death – Accident
Mr. James Hoey was near an entrance to the Constellation Brands-Marvin Sands Performing
Arts Center in Hopewell, NY to enjoy an Allman Brothers Concert when he tripped. He tried
to put his hands up to protect himself from the fall. However, his hands did not catch his fall
and he fell hitting his face against some concrete steps. The injuries caused his death.
(Pierce & Bauer, 2008).
Death – Assault
The family of Wesley Allen Shelton, who was stabbed to death at a concert by the Rolling
Stones in 1981, received a $4.7 million settlement. Most of the settlement was paid for by
Pace Concerts, which promoted the show (Settlement in concert death, 1986).
Cardiac arrest
A 38-year-old Massachusetts man suffered a fatal heart attack at the 2009 Kelly Clarkson
concert held in Agganis Arena at Boston University. The man collapsed during the pop
singer's show and the on-site emergency response team responded immediately. The man
was in cardiac arrest when emergency responders arrived and he did not respond to either
CPR or a defibrillator (Stanelun, 2009).
Crowd injuries
The primary articles associated with concert injuries tend to focus on large mass gatherings.
Several articles over the years have analyzed single concerts, but it is harder to draw solid
conclusions from single concerts (Grange, Green, & Downs, 1999). There is a wide variety
of concert types, but those associated with the most injuries will usually contain mosh pits,
crowd surfing, large outdoor venues on hot days, events where patrons are camping out for
days, events of long duration and events where large number of patrons are crowded
together and mobile. The rate of injuries at any concert is typically related to several
potential variables, such as; music type, concert location, average audience age, concert
length, audience size, crowd density, crowd movement patterns, weather, alcohol/drug
usage, and whether the facility was indoors or outdoors (Grange et al.). The most common
causes of injuries have focused on crowd surge, mosh pit injuries, crowd movement injuries
or heat-related injuries (Milsten et al., 2003). That doesn‟t exclude the possibility of a large
number of patients at small venue events without the aforementioned variables; you can still
have a fight or a riot at a small event (Grange et al.). While crowd related injuries are a
major concern, there are also individually inflicted injuries at all concerts. These injuries can
range from horsing around, mud-sliding, self-inflicted stabbings, food poisoning, and
countless other incidents. The most common self-inflicted injuries at concert are alcohol and
drug related incidents. While alcohol and drug related concerns were a major issue in the
1960s and 1970s, there is no proof that alcohol and drug use are the major cause of concertrelated injuries (Grange et al.). This does not mean that alcohol or drug usage is not present
at concert, as one study of five concerts identified 48% of patients treated at those concerts
admitted to using drugs/alcohol (Erickson, 1996).
A survey of rock concert related personal injuries was conducted in the 1970s in the San
Francisco Bay Area by doctors who provided medical coverage at thirty concerts in 1977.
The estimated total attendance at the 30 concerts was 521,400 concert-goers. A total of
1,006 major medical problems were reported with 696 of the incidents involving drug or
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alcohol-related medical issues. This represents 69% of all the major medical issues handled
by the researchers (Newmeyer & Johnson, n.d.). Newmeyer and Johnson reflected on Roger
Brown's (1954) comprehensive analysis of the forms of "mass phenomena", where Brown
focused on concert goers as a form of "expressive crowd" rather than simply an "audience".
According to Brown (1954: 863), "expressive crowds" tend to exhibit "revelrous behavior as a
release from the humdrum routine of normal life". Those participating in "expressive crowds"
do not radically alter their behavior. However, the presence of a crowd according to some
can loosen social controls and trigger inner pathologies (Turner, 1959). Loosened social
norms can possibly incite violent behavior such as fistfights, looting, lynchings, and beatings.
This type of mayhem might occur among sports audiences (especially at football, hockey,
and soccer events). However, the loosening of social norms in concert setting rarely results
in interpersonal violence, except for unusual instances, such as, the Hells Angels at
Altamont, California in 1969. (Newmeyer & Johnson). On the other hand, crowds may
provoke intrapsychic turmoil, upsetting an individual's internal equilibrium. Under such a
circumstance, some concert goers might find themselves in a group using a drug they have
never used before as they might not have internalized the subcultural controls which
successfully structure the drug experience (Newmeyer & Johnson). This does not mean that
there are not concert goes who might intentionally engage in violent conduct such as
intentionally fighting or being overly violent in a mosh pit, but others who would not
necessarily engage in such conduct might be swept by the circumstances into participating in
such activities.
This subculture created a rock concert tradition where fans, especially in the 1970s expected
to see significant drug use. Concert promoters hired medical staff to help assist with
intoxicated and overdosed fans. Such an “endorsement” encouraged some concert goers to
think that it was acceptable to use drugs without repercussion, and if there were any
problems they could be taken care of by medical staff (Newmeyer & Johnson). Newmeyer
and Johnson‟s study highlighted a significant number of incidents involving medical care for
drug and alcohol related incidents. Table 1 highlights the break-down of the reason for the
medical care given to the 696 treated concert goers. Alcohol was actually the most common
cause for treatment and even when two different items were ingested (i.e. different drugs
and/or alcohol), alcohol still was the number one concern, along with other drugs (Newmeyer
& Johnson).
Table 1. Drug Problems at 30 Concerts in 1977
Drug
Total Claims Percentage
Alcohol
420
60.2%
Marijuana
62
8.9
LSD
41
5.9
PCP
23
3.3
Psychedelics 13
1.9
Amphetamines 7
1.0
Barbiturates
5
0.7
Opiates
3
0.4
Cocaine
1
0.1
Other
1
0.1
Multiple drugs 120
17.3
(Source: Newmeyer, J. & Johnson, G., n.d.)
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A later study by Grange, Green and Downs (1999) analyzed 405 concerts in the 1990s and
found that alcohol and drugs was not as big of a concern at that point. Grange and his
colleagues were interested in examining the patients per ten thousand spectators (PPTT)
rate to help determine if certain concerts produced a higher number of injuries than other
concert. Previous research showed 8 PPTT for a 48 hour concert in 1973 that attracted
35,000 fans and produced only 241 patients to a PPTT of 1,000 for three day music festival
in New Zealand in 1973 that attracted 20,000 fans and produced almost 2,000 patients.
Grange and his colleague analyzed 405 concerts at three outdoor and two indoor venues in
Southern California. The concerts include, for example, 206 classical music, 13 country, 42
jazz, 21 easy listening, 71 rock, 17 alternative rock, seven heavy metal, and one rap concert.
A total of 4,638,099 fans attended those concerts and 1,492 patrons received medical care.
The average crowd for each concert was 10,999. Each of these concerts was held on a
single day and lasted from four to eight hours. The median PPTT per concert was 2.1 and
those who reported their age indicated that the median patient age was 29 years-old. Fifty
seven percent of the patients at these concerts were female. The highest number of injuries
at any one concert was 79 (including eight who had to be transported) at a Metallica concert,
and 53 concerts did not have any recorded patients. The Metallica concert had a mosh pit
and the resulting injuries included 16 head injuries, 21 lacerations/abrasions, 16 extremity
injuries, a stabbing, and a shoulder injury. At a separate punk concert which resulted in a
riot, 49 patients were recorded from a crowd of 5,768 (71 PPTT) fans. Seventy six percent of
the injuries were trauma related and 49% of the patients had head injuries. The break down
of injuries by music categories is highlighted in Table 2.
Table 2. Patient Evaluation by Music Category
Music category
PPTT
Classical
Country
Jazz and Blues
Easy Listening
Rock
Other
Total Concerts
Total Attendance
Total patients
206
13
59
21
85
21
2,096,471
125,620
675,313
215,778
1,258,355
251,227
402
35
224
40
653
137
1.7
2.2
2.0
1.8
3.8
5.8
(Source: Grange, et al., 1999)
In total, 11% (169 patients) of the patient records indicated alcohol or drug use contributed to
the reason the patients requested medical assistance. The most prominent injury involved
trauma 885 (59.3%) patients with 375 (42.4%) of these trauma cases arising at rock
concerts. The two most common trauma cases included musculoskeletal (308) followed by
head injuries (164). A majority of the head injuries 115/164 (70%) occurred at rock concerts.
There were 607 medical related patients at the concerts and 127 of these patients suffered
from some alcohol or drug related incident; 73.2% (93/127) of these incidents occurred at
rock concerts. Interestingly, only two of the injuries involved dehydration and 26 involved
heat/cold related incidents. There were four cardiac arrest incidents (all at non-rock
concerts) and the highest number of injuries (12.5 PPTT) occurred at the three
gospel/Christian music concerts which had the lowest median age of any of the concerts.
Grange et al. (1999) concluded that music type is the best predictor of possible patient load;
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and that temperature, overall attendance, and whether the concert was indoors or outdoors
did not impact PPTT.
Besides the typical injuries highlighted above, there always can be new issues that arise at
concerts. One of these unique concerns is headbanging. Headbanging is the act of violently
moving one‟s head in pace with the music and when there are fast paced songs, individuals
can injure their necks. Little formal injury research had been done on this phenomenon, even
though case reports indicate inherent risks, especially in head and neck injury. There are
only a few documented cases, neurosurgical specialists question whether the incidence is
much higher, because the symptoms are clinically silent or cause only mild headache that
resolves spontaneously (Headbanging injury could be avoided, 2008). Dr. Andrew McIntosh
of the University of New South Wales identified the "up-down" head banging style as the
most common (others included the circular swing, the full body, or the side-to-side) by
observing young people at hard-rock and heavy-metal concerts (Headbanging injury could
be avoided, 2008). Other concert specific activities include mosh pit dancing, missile
throwing, crowd surfing and fire jumping.
A 2008 published study revealed that an average head-banging song with a tempo of 146
beats a minute (common in many hard rock songs) will likely cause mild head injury when
the head's range of motion is greater than 75 degrees. At higher tempos and greater ranges
of motion there is an exponential rise in the risk of neck injury. The report hypothesized that
injuries might be minimized if head-bangers were advised to lessen their range of head and
neck motion and head-banging to every second beat, according to Dr. McIntosh
(Headbanging injury could be avoided, 2008). Other suggestions offered by the study
included training concert goers to be safer, asking fans to use personal protective equipment
(highly unlikely), and encouraging artist to design their sets so they can include both soft and
harder songs to prevent repeated hard songs one after another.
The above were the primary studies found highlighting either rate of occurrence or types of
medical related incidents occurring at concert. The lack of significant research as to what
are the most common causes of concert related injuries prompted this study.
Results
This research study was conducted in 1998-99 by the second author, Dr. Milsten, as an
attending emergency medicine physician working at mass gathering events, specifically for
this study at major concerts in several different venues in the mid-Atlantic region. The data
was derived from 21 concerts that attracted 343,318 concert goers. The concerts produced
1,036 patients treated for both major and minor incidents. All of the patients asked for
medical assistance and a report was completed for each such patron. Thus, individuals who
might have suffered an incident, but did not report the incident was not reported or recorded.
All the reports were entered into a database upon which the following analysis was based.
The most commonly requested assistance was for medical-related care; 602 headaches
incidents (58% of all incidents) compared with 434 trauma incidents (42%). A majority of the
patients were female (653), while 359 men requested medical care. There were 21 patient
records where the gender was not highlighted.
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Injury claims
The most common injury claims are shown in Table 3. This table highlights that injury from
musculoskeletal related injuries are the most common type of injuries followed by basic
requests for medical care. Heat related injuries are one of the most preventable injuries
(through water, shade, fans, mist, tents or air conditioning), yet represented the third most
common type of injury.
Table 3. Injury claims (1998-99)
Injury
Total Claims Percentage
Musculoskeletal
Medical request
Heat exhaustion
Dermal injury
Alcohol/Drugs
230
221
142
126
59
22.2%
21.0%
14.0%
12.2%
5.7%
Method of injury
The method of injury (MOI) was analyzed for each incident as shown in Table 4. Mosh pit
injuries were the most common type of injuries and 50 women were injured in the pits
compared with 24 men.
An almost equal number of men and women suffered
musculoskeletal injuries in mosh pits: 30 of the 50 women (60%) suffered such injuries and
13 of 24 men (54.2%) had musculoskeletal injuries. Crowd surfing was the forth most
commonly cited incident and 40 of the 63 surfers patrons were women. Fall and trips was
the fifth most cited incident and 15 of these injuries resulted in musculoskeletal injuries
(35.7%). In contrast, all the fights resulted in musculoskeletal injuries. Missiles (thrown
water bottles) resulted in 27 documented injuries impacting primarily women (55.5%) and
most of these injuries were dermal injuries.
Table 4. Method of injury
Method
No Record
Other Trauma
Mosh Pits
Crowd Surfing
Fall/Trip
Missiles
Fights
Total claims
589
222
74
63
42
27
12
Percentage
56.8%
21.4
7.1
6.1
4.0
2.6
1.1
Mosh pit. Analysis of mosh pit injuries showed that the most common causes were
musculoskeletal (33 incidents), followed by dermal (14), exhaustion (14), and other injuries
(6). Those injured in the mosh pit area ranged from age 13-31 years, with 16 patients age 16
years, 12 age 15 years, 11 age 19 years, and 10 injured fans in both the 17 and 18 year-old
categories. The high prevalence of minors in the mosh pits became an issue as these
patrons sometimes required treatment and transport to hospitals, and their parents were hard
to locate. In terms of where the mosh pit patrons were injured, 17 involved facial injuries, 14
were reported as no record, 12 involved head injuries, eight neck injuries, seven arm injuries
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and seven ankle/feet injuries. Thus, 37 of the reported injuries in mosh pits were to the head,
face, or neck; representing 50% of all mosh pit injuries. However, only 24% (18) of the mosh
pit injuries required advanced care and of these only seven involved a patron suffering face
or neck injuries.
Crowd surfing. Crowd surfing injury analysis revealed that the majority of causes were
musculoskeletal (43), followed by injury (8), and dermal (7). Crowd surfing injured patrons
from age 13-34, with 52 (82.5%) of the injuries suffered by patrons from 13-19. Of the teens
injured in crowd surfing incidents, 35 of the 52 (67.3%) were females. The crowd surfing
injuries produced 18 cases requiring advanced care. Thus, most cases required only basic
care (71.4%). All but one of the advanced care incidents involved an injury to the head, face,
or neck.
Falls. Falls/trips often occur to the elderly, but anyone can fall, trip over items/people, or slip
on various spilled items. Of the 42 total falls/trips, 12 (28.6%) of the injured were over age
32. A majority of the injuries in this category were to legs (11) or ankles (8), but as would be
expected with people trying to brace their falls there were six injuries to head/face and four to
hands.
Age
While concerts are open to a large range of fans, most injuries occurred to those under age
30. The most common age for injuries was between ages 15-18 as shown in Table 5. In
total 357 patrons in that age range were injured, representing 34.5% of all the injuries. While
there is no age break-down for all those attending the concert, it would be assumed that teen
and those in their early 20s were the primary attendees. Some or all of the concerts served
alcohol so some shows might have had a larger number of patrons over age 21.
Table 5. Age of injured patron
Age
6
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
Number of Injuries
1
1
2
1
15
36
70
99
100
88
58
43
27
27
25
15
14
7
7
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28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
42
44
45
48
51
52
No Record
12
11
6
5
9
7
7
8
6
1
1
3
2
2
3
2
1
3
2
295
While most of the concert goers were younger, 67 of the injured people were over age 30.
Of these older patrons, 44 were females. Also, 15 of the injured “seniors” required transport.
Primary Diagnosis
The most common primary diagnosis was musculoskeletal injuries as displayed in Table 6.
These injuries can range from minor abrasions, females lacerations, contusions to fractures.
The second most common diagnosis involved a request for medication (specifically, Tylenol
or Motrin) mostly for headaches or other minor bodyaches.
Table 6. Primary diagnosis
Diagnosis
Musculoskel
Medication
Exhaustion
Dermal Injury
Inges
Headaches
Distress
Epistaxis
Dehydration
Injury
Other Med
Eye injury
Insect Bites
Dizziness
No record
Syncope
GI Complaint
Number
229
220
141
125
58
46
29
27
24
21
16
13
12
11
10
10
7
Percentage
22.10
21.23
13.61
12.06
5.6
4.4
2.8
2.6
2.3
2.0
1.54
1.25
1.16
1.06
0.09
0.09
0.07
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Alternet Loc.
Diabetes
Seizure
Abdominal
OB/GYN
Other Trauma
Band-Aid Req.
Foreign Body
4
4
4
3
3
3
2
2
0.04
0.04
0.04
0.02
0.02
0.02
0.02
0.02
Heat Exhaustion was the third most frequent primary diagnosis. Of the 141 heat exhaustion
cases, 107 involved females while only 34 involved males. Of these patients, 57 were
treated and released, 40 left the first-aid station without treatment (against medical advice),
24 were sent home (instead of being treated and released back to the concert), and six
received other treatment. The heat exhaustion claims broken down by age are shown in
Table 7.
Table 7. Exhaustion injuries by age
Age
13
14
15
16
17
18
Men
Number of Cases
2
2
4
5
6
4
Age
14
15
16
17
18
19
Women
Number of Cases
9
19
16
10
17
9
Dehydration was cited by 25 patients and five of these patients required advanced care.
Females were more likely to suffer from dehydration (18) versus only 7 men suffered from
dehydration. Half the women who suffered from dehydration were 16 years old which would
tend to show that younger women were more likely to be dehydrated than any other group.
Location of injury
The location of the injury (LOI) can help highlight what specific issues patrons might face.
Most records did not highlight the LOI as shown in Table 8. However, there are some
regions where an injury was more likely to be incurred. The upper body (neck, head, and
face) was highlighted 225 (21.72%) times and represented the most frequently recorded LOI.
The next most frequent area of injuries was the lower extremities encompassing the feet,
ankles, and legs which appeared 118 times (11.39%).
Table 8. Location of injury
Location
No Record
Head
Face
Feet
Ankle
Number
626
108
93
43
40
Percentage
60.42
10.42
8.97
4.15
3.86
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Legs
Arms
Neck
Chest
Back
Abdomen
Pelvis/Groin
35
29
24
18
13
4
3
3.38
2.80
2.32
1.73
1.25
0.04
0.03
Treatment
Most patients were treated and released back to the concert (see Table 9). There were three
treatment categories; minor, basic and advanced (minor care requiring treatment of less than
5 minutes; basic care, 5–15 minutes; and advanced care, >15 minutes). Furthermore, the
minor category was assigned to patients presenting only for medication or bandage requests.
Transportation was provided for 142 patrons representing 13.7% of all the injured parties.
Basic care was provided in 638 incidents (61.58%). Minor care was provided in 217 cases
(20.95%). Advanced care was provided in 180 incidents (17.37%).
Table 9. How patron was treated
Treatment
Number
Treat/Release 439
No Record
200
Transport
142
AMA
126
Home
74
Other
53
Percentage
42.37
19.31
13.71
12.16
7.14
5.11
Of those who required transportation, the majority were injured through falls and/or trips (10
incidents). The other most common reasons for patients to be transported included crowd
surfing (eight), mosh pits (six), missiles (three), and fight (two).
Recommendation
The various research studies highlighted shows that crowd surges are a concern, but not
necessarily the major concern. The major concerns focus on musculoskeletal injuries,
younger fans, and women. Through educating fans of appropriate behavior, utilizing more
patron/crowd supervisors, and creating more room for people to move, the number of
muscle-skeletal injuries could be reduced. Bumps and bruises are the most common injury
and there is no way to reduce all such injuries. However, proactive risk management can
help reduce the number of falls and trips, which can significantly reduce the number of
injuries.
The research results highlighted a large number of heat exhaustion and dehydration related
injuries. Heat related incidents can be reduced through providing free or cheap water, fan
education about hats and sunblock lotion, using shade structure, and providing misting areas
during outdoor events. The research results also highlighted a number of musculoskeletal
injuries from crowd surfing and mosh pits. These bumps and bruises were primarily minor
injuries; they were followed by dermal (skin) injuries as the most likely injuries faced by those
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in such environments. This is not meant to suggest that mosh pits and crowd surfing are not
potentially dangerous, although, it is sometimes very difficult or impossible to stop such
activities. Crowd surfing and moshing can occur even with numerous rules preventing such
activities. Concert promoters and venues should try to prevent such activities as much as
possible to reduce the number of head injuries.
The number of thrown missiles (bottles and fruit), stabbings, and alcohol or drugs brought
into the event can be reduced with thorough entrance door checks. While it is impossible to
catch every item snuck into a venue, more vigilance can help reduce such attempts. If bottle
tops are removed (whether at the entrance checks or when sold at concession stands) the
risk of some missiles can be reduced.
One of the most important recommendations to help reduce concert patron injury is to
recognize the need for a planned and properly managed medical response component. The
medical response component cannot be an after thought for large events. Medical response
planning needs to be integrated with other event functions (such as security and
communications). The National Association of EMS Physicians (NAEMSP) produced a mass
gathering planning document that can help in this regard (Jaslow & Milsten, 2000). Planners
need to be prepared for injuries with enough medical personnel and equipment. Grange
recommends preparing for 13.7 PPTT with a rock concert and 7.1 PPTT for a non-rock
concert.
The research results have highlighted that the treatment of cardiac arrest (such as heart
attacks) needs to be included in the mass gathering medical plans. The rate of heart attacks
at mass gatherings is higher then it is for the general population. To help address the
concern associated with cardiac arrest, venues and promoters should have access to AED –
automatic defibrillators at concerts to help those suffering cardiac issues (Crocco, 2004).
This issue is especially acute at classical music and other concerts that are likely to attract
older fans.
Conclusion
Whenever you have a large number of fans at a venue there is the possibility of injuries. The
type of injuries is dependent on the type of music played. Rock concerts are the most
dangerous shows and produce the greatest number of injuries. Women and younger concert
goers are at the greatest risk. While there are numerous injuries at concert, many of these
same injuries would be seen at any type of event. Traditional injuries from falls, sun burns,
dehydration, scrapes, and headaches will always occur. Through utilizing a mass gathering
medical plan, a concert can help develop more effective measures to handle these injuries
as they occur.
One of the unique conclusions uncovered in this research is the prevalence of drug and
alcohol related medical needs and how that concern has changed over the years. Drugs and
alcohol related incidents are no longer the same concern they were twenty years before this
study was undertaken. While 69% of the medical issues in 1977 were associated with drugs
and alcohol, only 5.7% of the medical care cases in 1998-99 involved drugs or alcohol.
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References
Brown, Roger 1954 "Mass Phenomena", in G. Lindzey and E. Aronson (eds.) Handbook of
Social Psychology (v. 2) Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley (pp. 833-877).
Crocco TJ, Sayre MR, Liu T, Davis SM, Cannon C, Potluri J. (2004). Mathematical
determination of external defibrillators needed at mass gatherings. Prehosp Emerg Care. JulSep;8(3):292-7.
Erikson, T., Aks, S., Koenigsberg, M., Bunney E., Schurgin, B., and Levy p. (1996). Drug use
patterns at major rock concert events. Ann Emerg Med. 28:22-6.
Grange JT, Green SM, Downs W (1999, March)..Concert medicine: spectrum of medical
problems encountered at 405 major concerts. Acad Emerg Med. 6(3):202-7
Headbanging injury could be avoided. (2008, December 19). Science Alert. Retrieved July
16, 2010 from http://www.sciencealert.com.au/news/20081912-18604-2.html.
Jaslow D, Yancey A, Milsten A: Mass Gathering Medical Care. Prehospital Emergency Care
2000; 4(4): 359-360. Available from
http://www.naemsp.org/documents/MassGatheringOrdrFrm.pdf.
LeBon, Gustav 1947 The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind London: E. Bennett.
McGirk, J. (2001, October 23). Children killed in concert crowd crush. The Independent.
Retrieved July 29, 2010 from http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/childrenkilled-in-concert-crowd-crush-632337.html.
Milsten A., Seaman K., Liu P., Bissell R., Maguire B.: (2003). Variables influencing medical
usage rates, injury patterns, and levels of care for mass gatherings. Prehospital and Disaster
Medicine 2003; 18(4): 334–346.
Mohr, A. (2010, July 25). Crowd control failure at music festival responsible for history's most
deadly concert trampling. Associated Content from Yahoo. Retrieved on July 29, 2010 from
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/5619880/crowd_control_failure_at_music_festival.h
tml?cat=2.
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8 SIMULATION-AIDED PLANNING FOR EVENTS
Ulrike Merz1,2, Tobias Kretz3, Markus Wiersch4, Carola Schulz1,5, Peter Vortisch1,6
1: Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), D-76128 Karlsruhe.
2: now at Daimler AG, D-71059 Sindelfingen, [email protected]
3: PTV AG, Stumpfstr. 1, D-76131 Karlsruhe, [email protected], corresponding author
4: Das Fest GmbH, Durlacher Allee 64, D-76131 Karlsruhe, [email protected]
5: now at Robert Bosch GmbH, Auf der Breit 4, D-76227 Karlsruhe.
[email protected]
6: Insitut für Verkehrswesen, Otto Ammann-Platz 9, [email protected].
June 2011
Abstract
This study investigates how computer simulations of crowds of pedestrians can support the
planning of events. It looks into documented experiences collected in past projects and enters
into a dialogue with opposing, supportive and critical views, on simulations, and advances a
realistic argument on how simulations as a tool fit into the toolbox of event planning. The
paper starts with an incident which occurred at a stadium's entrance gates to motivate more
fundamental considerations and concludes with details of a project done for the festival “Das
Fest” in Karlsruhe.
Introduction
Computers have made their way to many aspects of life and to most professions, and are
used for various planning tasks.
Soon after the first models of vehicular dynamics had been introduced (Reuschel, 1950; ;
Newell, 1961; ; Wiedemann, 1974; Gipps,1981;
Nagel & Schreckenberg, 1992;
Chowdhury, Santen, & Schadschneider, 2000; Helbing, 2001), models of pedestrian
dynamics were also formulated (e.g. Gipps, 1986; Helbing & Molnar, 1995; Blue & Adler,
1998). The first application of crowd simulations was to enhance safety during emergency
egress from buildings. Apart from evacuation and escape crowd simulations have been used
to simulate passengers transferring within a station, pedestrians as participants of traffic, and
people walking to, from or at an event.
This paper discusses perspectives on the usage of simulations for the planning of events; as
such it deals with both exaggerated expectations and also benefits that can be achieved
with simulation tools but which are frequently missed, when the usage of simulations is
discussed. At this point we note that simulations are elements of the planning process and
therefore cannot prevent a bad implementation of best practice planning, for example if less
staff was available on the day of the event than planned.
At the Gates
“Weeping and screaming children at the hands of their desperate
parents, elderly people, who were gasping for air and feared to be
crushed – because other spectators, who demanded admittance,
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pushed and pressed from behind. This was the shocking scenario in
front of the south gate of the arena.
The guests of the club Hertha BSC [Berlin] were there penned up
behind barriers and were only dealt with one by one at snake pace by
far too few staff. Fans, who stood in front of the stadium at 2 pm,
could take their seats only a few minutes before the kick off [planned
for 3:30 pm].”
(Translated from Wolf, 2005)
This excerpt from a newspaper article together with the reactions it spawned in online forums
is a documentation of an incident that presumably did not cause any permanent damage nor
much attention outside Berlin. However, the incident and the then forthcoming soccer world
championship triggered activity to address the problem. Already for the next league match
more favorable feedback on the issue is documented on the web indicating that procedures
were changed and for that reason ingress to the match went more relaxed.
The incident made it to the newspapers as in Europe soccer, in general, receives much
attention, and also the number of people involved was remarkable. However, on events of a
smaller scale, similar incidents occur every day, which suggest that the problem is not one of
a spectacularly large event, extreme conditions, which cause tragic casualties; rather it may
be one of infrastructure and of procedures not meeting the demand, nor being able to cope
with injuries, annoyed customers, and bad press.
An incident like the one in Berlin, we suggest, could be triggered by different causes: bad
planning or bad execution of the planning; it could also be that the number of fans who
attended was unforeseeable. In the Berlin‟s event, the latter was not the case as the match
was sold out.
Without actually making a claim about what caused the incident, we assume in this paper
that the day in Berlin went as planned, where no major organizational element that was
planned for was missing or modified. In this way the incident can be used as concrete
example of what would have been accessible with simulations.
Exaggerations
When simulations of pedestrians or traffic systems are discussed in the public, one
sometimes gets the impression that a simulation is mistaken for a crystal bowl telling the
future. This high expectation might be rooted in the nearly unlimited confidence in and
expectation of technology in general and computer technology in particular.
Simulation no more than a tool made to serve particular purposes. For this it only uses
aspects of reality as input and is only able to reproduce aspects of reality. As the justification
for any tool is to be useful and helpful, the results from using a simulation of crowds or
vehicle traffic needs to be policy sensitive, as Bell (1997) described it.
A good example for a non-perfect image of reality that is helpful and which offers a policy
sensitive usage is that of a street map of a city. A street map is only a very imperfect image
of a city; it does not contain information on the culture, language, smells, climate, kitchen,
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club life, and the millions of individual daily lives the city houses. Street maps of New York,
Florence, Cairo, and Tokyo may look very similar. If the differences between the real cities
were actually as small as their map differences, no one would travel around the world for a
visit. Satellite photos offer a better idea of possible differences, although they too are still 2D
images. Yet a street map (maybe in combination with a compass) is helpful and policy
sensitive for the purpose of choosing the right direction when navigating through the city;
hence the lasting success of the concept of a map.
In planning a public event cited in the introduction, a helpful purpose of the simulation might
have been to learn about the number of fans in the queue in front of the gates, maybe, to
learn about the average individual queuing time. This might have sufficiently improved the
basis for decisions in the planning to trigger additional measures. With the exaggerated
expectations from simulations there are two linked dangers: the first is that meeting the
expectations is correctly estimated to be very difficult if not impossible. Doing simulations is
then rejected as being unhelpful and simulations are removed from the planner's toolbox. As
a consequence the existing realistic benefits of simulations are are ignored. The second
danger is a consequence of the opposite extreme position, namely to take the results of a
simulation as fulfilling the expectations ignoring the purpose of the project and the abilities of
the model. From this it is only a small step to assume that simulations can be used to replace
other efforts to ensure safety, even to be able to relinquish local and scene-specific
organizational experience. Yet it is this experience that allows, for example, to estimate how
a certain social group will react under certain circumstances, something which cannot come
as a result of the simulation.
Calibration and Intended Results
To take into account the effect of various external influences a model of pedestrian dynamics
has a number of parameters, which can be calibrated to produce quantitatively reliable
output. This section deals with latest efforts to collect data that can be used for calibration
and with limits to the precision of a pedestrian simulation model.
There are numbers of factors that influence the desired as well as the maximum speed.
Some of these are age, sex, environmental temperature, time of day (Weidmann, 1993;
Buchmüller & Weidmann, 2006), motivation (closely linked with the walking purpose), and
individual fitness. The precise impact of each factor is not easy to measure; whenever one is
measuring walking speed at some spot in a city, it inevitably is at a certain temperature and a
certain time of day. Each time of day implies a bias in the sample of persons being
measured, i.e. in age and walking purpose. Collecting data at some spot and time therefore
allows calibrating a simulation model to simulate pedestrians at that spot and time. The
calibration may also be a good one for simulations at another spot and time, but not
necessarily the best one.
Even more discussed than the free, unrestricted walking speed at very low densities is the
relation between walking speed and density and the flow volumes (number of people per
time) that fit through a door or corridor of a given width. Over the decades in different realms
different relations have become acknowledged that differ a lot one from the other
(Schadschneider, et al., 2009). There exist, for example, two acknowledged works of which
one assumes standstill at a density which is below the density of maximal flow claimed in the
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other work. Part of the reason of such discrepancies may be that flow and densities have
been measured with different methods (Zhang, Klingsch, Schadschneider, & Seyfried, 2011).
Also, the location of measurement can lead to significantly different results; for example, in a
simple and specific situation students in Germany and India are found to walk at a different
pace in identical density (Chattaraj, Seyfried, & Chakroborty, 2009).
Some experiments were carried out, as part of the ongoing HERMES research project (Holl
& Seyfried, 2009, 2010; Klüpfel, et al., 2010), to measure bi-directional flows, flows around
corners and merging flows (Klüpfel, et al., 2010). |These experiments were thought as
equally important for simulation projects but which have not yet received as much attention
as the one-directional flow through a door or the one-directional flow through a corridor. Only
parts of the results have been published so far (Zhang, Klingsch, Schadschneider, &
Seyfried, 2011).
In this study, a simulation was carried out looking at the number of people queuing normally;
it did not consider situations where they might panic, start shoving each other and the
resulting consequences. This is because the empirical knowledge of the combined effect of
crowd psychology and spatial properties on the dynamics of the crowd is not strong enough
to built reliable algorithms. However, if one combines the number of people queuing as
calculated by a simulation with the experience of a local crowd manager, one can often get a
good idea of what would happen. The lesson of this is that simulations should supplement
existing planning and not replace elements of it.
Categorization of Projects
With the thoughts of the last section, is there any hope that simulation projects can yield
absolute “correct” results (numbers)? The answer is „yes‟ depending on what is meant with
“correct” and which output parameters need to be “correct”.
- … if there is a possibility to measure in a very similar situation and environment and
use that data for calibration. Probably the most important input data is at what time
how many people arrive at the boundaries of the simulation (i.e. the “demand“),
- … if “correct“ is not expected to be closer to reality than the inherent variability of
reality is. For example for the simulation of the egress from a soccer stadium this
means that the simulated duration times need to be allowed to lie within that range of
observed real durations. An allowed stricter expectation is that the simulated
distribution matches the observed distribution, and
- … if the parameter that needs to be “correct“ is not a manifestly non-statistical one, as
for example individual trajectories.
A station that is to be modified offers the possibility to fulfill the first condition: the passengers
can be video-taped, relevant parameters (number of persons, density, walking speed, and
dwell times) can be evaluated, used for the calibration of an “as is” simulation and with the
calibrated parameters a “what if” simulation can be done (see Figure 1). There are many
reasons why such a simulation still has uncertainty, these include: the demand forecast has
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an uncertainty and the population characteristics may change24. But apart from that – if the
calibration process can be done successfully – the uncertainty added by the pedestrian
dynamics model for a good model should be small or at least not larger than the uncertainty
from other sources of which two have been mentioned above.
Figure 1: For the simulation of North Melbourne Station considerable effort has been put to collect data
for a calibration of the simulation to reproduce the situation as it is today (Laufer, 2008).
Note, however, that in Laufer (2008), the calibration was done relating to speed, density, and
walking times; three basic and general parameters. It was not attempted to calibrate for the
mood change induced on the passengers by the state on the platform, it was also not
calibrated for the average amount of beverages bought by passengers in the station. This is
one of the issues with the word “correct”. Which parameter has to be correct? A simulation
that aims to give an answer to the question of the capacity of the station, the parameters that
need to be correct are density, speed, and walking time. In other words, one must make
oneself clear about the purpose of the model. A purpose, just as geometry and demand
(Rahmatabadi, 2010), needs to be part of a simulation model. A clear statement about the
purpose also implicitly defines what a simulation model ought not to answer. This is
necessary as it limits the degree of precision and details which are necessary as input to the
simulation and thus limits the necessary amount of work and therefore also monetary costs.
The second issue with “correct” is that in real life density, walking speeds and walking times
on two different days would not be exactly identical; even if on these two days the same
number of people would alight from a train and board it. In real life, measurements always
result in distributions; thus “correct” can only be correct with the background of these
distributions.
24
If the „what if“ scenario is 20 years to the future, for example effects of the dynamics of
the average BMI may take place.
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The above example can be categorized in two ways: first it is a “high precision / high effort”
project, and second it is a station project. The first categorization is based on a) what is the
purpose, and following from that, b) how the project was done. The second categorization is
the type of application; for this project it it is typically to test if capacities and transfer times to
connecting trains are sufficient.
If no empirical data in comparable situations is available a reliable calibration cannot be
carried out. However, this does not necessarily mean that simulation cannot turn out to be a
helpful tool. Even without confidence in the absolute values of the results, there still can be
confidence in the policy sensitivity of the simulation project (Bell, 1997).
One way – and this is the next purpose/method-related category – to carry out such a
simulation project is a comparative study. For example, different variants of an infrastructure
configuration or an egress organization plan or variants in any other degree of freedom of a
system can be compared by making multiple simulation runs using different sets of
parameters of the dynamics model. Sections 5.1 and 5.2 of Kretz (2007) give an example of
a project undertaken with this method for an emergency egress procedure at a sports event.
The intention was to find the best planner-proposed variant according to some specific but
arbitrary criteria (e.g. best LOS or smallest egress times). Success is only possible, if a vast
majority of parameter sets of the dynamics model yield the same variant as the best one.
This implies that there is a chance that such a simulation project fails in the sense that it
might not yield a result.
Another category of projects, currently unavailable, but which could generate benefit from
pedestrian simulations without entailing calibration work to a simulation project, is planning
for a „building fire‟. Here, it is by no means clear, how large the fire will be, which materials
will be set on fire and how the combustion smoke will be composed. Obviously there is no
way of calibrating the effect of a building fire. To allow fire safety engineers to develop an
intuition for the interplay of fire and building, a small set of „design fires‟ are defined and
integrated into regulations. These provide a common ground on which the statement “in case
of the design fire the height of the smoke free volume falls below 2 meter” immediately has a
meaning to fire safety engineers. The simulation of pedestrians, for example, the RiMEA
initiative (Brunner, et al., 2009) (see figure Figure 3), aims to achieve a comparable state. By
defining a set of standard examples which need to be simulated with model parameters such
that certain „result corridors‟ are met, implicitly for different models of pedestrian dynamics
parameter sets are defined that have a meaning for anyone familiar with RiMEA's guidelines.
The difference to fire safety engineering is that the design fire is defined explicitly, while the
parameters of the simulation models are defined implicitly with the definition of the „design
scenarios‟. This includes the uncertainty if parameters obtained in this way for different
simulation models yield similar results when they are used to simulate other situations. Note
that although a realistic definition of the expected result corridors gives rise to the
expectation that the obtained parameters lead to realistic simulation results in other
situations, it is not necessary that the results come very close to the real particular situation.
The benefit of this method of doing a project lies in the common ground provided by the
design scenarios.
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Figure 2: Snapshot of a simulation animation. From each side 25,000 pedestrians per hour walk towards
the crossing. The snapshot is made before any relevant interaction between the four directions occurs,
which shows that details of the underlying pedestrian dynamics model in this case are irrelevant. Already
now it can be seen (even better in the animation than in the still image) that the capacity might be
insufficient. A rough calculation will confirm this. However, the point is that this issue might be overseen
as long as it only occurs in form of some tables in the planning process, maybe even distributed over
several pages. In the form as it is shown here, the problem cannot be missed.
The three approaches to a simulation project as mentioned above implicitly assume that a
simulation project is carried out because one is aware of critical elements in the planning and
that simulations are used to answer the question “Does it work?“ or “Can it work?“. However,
if the simulated process has some degree of complexity it may happen that a simulation
initially generates awareness for possible problems. In our experience this happens
frequently during the process of building up the simulation model before starting the
simulation for the first time. This suggests that often a simulation project will succeed in
generating awareness for possible problems correctly even if the dynamic model is calibrated
for some average situation and not for the specific local conditions.
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Figure 3: Snapshot from a simulation of a RiMEA test case (Brunner, et al., 2009).
A typical project, where a simulation is used with the intention of a „check list‟ to „generate
awareness‟, is a large scale event in a newly built event infrastructure, where no experience
exists and no preceding event could have created awareness of problems. The way how a
simulation can be made use of then is to first do a classical planning, for example, with Excel
sheets making use of the Predtechenskii & Milinskii‟s (1978) theory, and then use the
simulation as described optionally in conjunction with the intention of a refined planning.
Once awareness has been created for possible problems, a solution is often at hand
following from the planners experience without further usage of elaborate methods.
Planning for very large projects, e.g. first Formula 1 Race in Abu Dhabi (Figure 4) a check list
mode project is suggested. First the geometry would have to be modeled precisely, including
every single litter can. Precision constraints in the model are implied, if undertaking precise
check list is excluded by budget or time constraints. Second it is often the case that one
cannot be sure of having a precise estimate of the demand and how it varies over time.
The fact that a project with this purpose and carried out in this manner often produces
benefits during the creation stage of the model (geometry, population, etc) is usually
overlooked and after a project is completed it is often forgotten that this actually has
happened. At the same time this fact also shows that – while it is of course also desirable to
have the parameters calibrated as much as possible for the local conditions – normally the
purpose can be fulfilled by using average parameters for the simulation25 which are known to
25
Using average parameters for the whole simulated population regardless of social or
cultural peculiarities may give the impression of doing only a “rough check” of the planning.
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produce plausible results. In such a kind of project a visualization of the simulation can be
sufficient and measurements and analysis of these might not be necessary.
Figure 4: Still image from a simulation made to assist planning for the first Formula 1 Race in Abu Dhabi.
This simulation was multi-modal: the visitors arrived by car, walked to the bus hubs (as one is shown in
the image here), boarded the buses there, were taken by the bus to their grandstand, alighted there and
passed the security check. When the simulated pedestrians reached the grandstands, they were taken
out of the simulation. The results of the simulation among other effects lead to the construction of an
additional tunnel for pedestrians and increased crew presence at predicted hotspots. In retrospective the
simulation was acknowledged to have given the right hints and had not missed an important issue.
Simulation visualization can help to develop an intuitive understanding of large demand
numbers. 3D visualizations can intuitively and immediately show where ends do not meet.
The alternative method of realizing this from sequences of linked tables is arduous, takes a
lot of time, and does not lead to the same degree of conviction that one has not missed a
problem as a simulation with its visualization does.
To accept that a project carried out in this way with this limited precision has its justification,
one has to compare it to standard planning procedures and their precision which reach limits
Nevertheless as is demonstrated in (Mayer-Zawar, Schomborg, & Schroeders, 2009) such a
simulation is a much more detailed level of planning than a classical planning approach
based only on densities, speeds and flows as suggested by (Transportation Research Board,
2000) (Kommission Bemessung von Straßenverkehrsanlagen, 2001)).
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in the size and complexity of today‟s buildings and events. One must not compare it to a
high-precision measurement or simulation in physics as judged on this ground no simulation
of a system that involves human actions can stand ground (Bell, 1997). The standards of the
classical natural sciences nevertheless can serve as a guiding light for the direction in which
models and simulations of social systems should develop.
An Example: Simulation for “Das Fest”
Introduction and Motivation
“Das Fest” (Das Fest GmbH, 2012) is an annual event taking place in Karlsruhe, Germany,
at a weekend mid to end July. It has a history of more than 25 years and in the course of
these years has grown from an audience of a few dozens to about 200,000 during the course
of the weekend. The area is one of the city's parks and has not been specifically constructed
to host events. It has an elongated form (Google, 2012). One end of the area is used for the
music festival part of Das Fest while at the other end Das Fest has more the character of a
fair addressing and attracting families with young children and giving clubs and organizations
space to present themselves. For a number of years it has become usual that at the music
festival at each of the three evenings one or two of the most prominent national bands or
even well-known international acts are presented to the audience (examples include Seeed
and the Beatsteaks). The fair part Das Fest, on the other hand, houses activities of which
some are rather common (for example activity spots for the very young, presentations of
non-profit organizations, parties and clubs) others are more uncommon (e.g. finger skate
boarding and volley club), but in any case activities with very limited commercial potential.
In this way Das Fest attracts people from all of society; the audience is socially very
heterogeneous, comprises local as well as more remotely located even people from outside
Germany, and it changes constantly from Friday afternoon to Sunday night. This alone sets
Das Fest apart from most other events. However, for a festival of that size and with such
rather highly-ranked artists, its most special feature might be that it has been admittance-free
and even without tickets until 2009. As a consequence there was never a limit on the number
of visitors one could expect to show up at the area. One of the main reasons – aside tradition
– why Das Fest was kept free so long, although it had grown large and attractive to the
masses, is that the non-commercial fair part has no chance to survive as part of a festival
with usual ticket prices.
After in 2009 the audience for the top act had grown very large, it was decided that the
number of visitors had to be controlled with a ticket system. The area of the festival was
divided into a music area and a free area. Tickets had only to be bought to access the music
area and the security checks were in place to control access for the whole area. Therefore,
two spatially separated queuing systems had to be installed: one for security checks for all
visitors, and one forticket checks for the music area.
As this was a comparatively large re-configuration of the entrance procedure of preceding
years, the desire arose to verify the capacity of the whole system and check in advance as
much as possible for potential problems. The project was carried out as part of a Master's
thesis in 2010. It was preceded in former years by the creation of animations which were
displayed at the festival's video walls to inform the visiting crowd about the position of the
emergency routes and exits (Beller & Kretz, 2010).
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Project Work
While it was a rather straight forward task to model the geometry of the festival area as well
as the infrastructure of the public transport service, fixing the demand (the temporal
distribution of fan arrival) was more difficult. As there has been no ticket system in use in
preceding years, there was no data available, and even if it had been available, the relative
attractiveness of the artists for the various types of fans has a major impact on when, and
how pronounced the peak arrival time is to be expected. To estimate this variable is not easy
and as it is an input to the simulation, the estimated uncertainty with it is a lower bound to the
expected precision of the simulation result.
The estimation then was done as follows: the local tram service organization (VBK) had
compiled data from experience of when it is necessary to double the train services to the
festival area. This information was interpreted such that at that point in time the trains at the
lower frequency were fully occupied. Furthermore it was assumed that about the same
number of people arrived by car, foot or bike as by tram. This information for a fixed point in
time was combined with estimations about the attractiveness of the artists to the crowd and
how much the audiences of the last three presenting artists overlap26. In repeated
discussions (see Figure 5) which included the presentation of the current state of the
simulation, the festival organizers were given the possibility to modify this theoretical
estimation based on their experience.
Figure 6 shows how the estimation of arrival flows clearly deviates from later on-site counts.
With this deviation it is immediately clear that the simulation cannot “show what is going to
happen when” which would be the most preferable information of any planning tool.
Nevertheless, as we will show presently, the conclusion that a simulation “cannot help” is not
correct as well. Already, Figure 6 can indirectly be seen as a benefit of the simulation. As the
simulation relies so strongly on knowing about the demand, the creation of the simulation
model revealed very clearly the limited knowledge which exists and has created a desire to
clarify this issue with increased efforts for visitor counting in future editions of Das Fest. Such
data would be of use for any kind of planning work, apart from its use in simulations.
The simulation – carried out using the software package VISSIM (PTV AG, 2010) – made
immediately clear that counter flows would occur at an undesirable spot and in unacceptable
numbers, see Figure 7. As a consequence the barrier locations and process configuration
was modified. This issue is an example of a problem, which appears to be obvious in
retrospect, once the simulation has created awareness for it. To create awareness, no
arduous analysis of the simulation results is necessary, as awareness comes directly from
the animated 3D visualization of the simulation. Nevertheless, it is not self-evident that such
an issue comes to mind without simulations, as it is just one among hundreds of elements
that need to be thought over in the planning for such an event. During the project some other
issues were similarly brought up; dealing with the simulation model, for example, triggered
that one staff person per ticket gate group was added to assist wheelchairs and parents with
kid buggies to pass the ticket gates.
26
As an example the last artist might be by far the most prominent one, but if the two artists
before him address the same audience, one can assume many people to arrive earlier and
not leave until the end.
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After this re-configuration the flows and queues in the simulation were considered to be
acceptable. As a next step a “What if...?” scenario was investigated: it was assumed that the
ticket gate right behind the security check was broken and out of service, and that all visitors
had to walk first to the admittance free area to access the music area from there using one of
the other ticket gates, see Figure 8. First it was simulated what would happen if a majority of
these visitors would head for the nearest ticket gate (see Figure 9). The result clearly
indicated that in the case of a broken ticket gate at the security check, care must be taken for
a good distribution of the visitors on the remaining ticket gates – for example by having
security staff advising people where to go.
Figure 5: Schematic representation of the workflow including the communication between simulation
modeler and festival organizer. This process occurred when the demand was jointly determined and as
well in later stages of the project. This means that modeling and result delivery were not separated,
sequential stages but were interwoven.
We conclude this section with an interesting observation from the festival: at the first day with
the new entrance procedure in place, the first ticket gate to the area was heavily frequented
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(see Figure 10). This happened especially in the last 30 minutes before the headlining artist
was announced to start. It appeared that at that time not only more visitors arrived at the
area, but that they were also in a hurry and for that reason did not take the time to search for
another entrance – which actually would have saved them a lot of time. To achieve a
balanced usage of all the ticket gates, many more visitors would have had to follow the signs
and pass the first visible ticket gate and walk to one of the others (which were not visible at
the first ticket gate). In this way the queue in front of the ticket gate resembled much the
simulated queue shown in Figure 9 but for another reason than the one assumed in the
simulation. This behavior changed already at the second day; the ticket gate usage was
much more balanced. The visitors apparently were not willing to be guided by signs, but they
were willing to let themselves be guided by their own experience and knowledge. This shows
that to set the route choice ratios in a simulation model one has to be very clear about the
visitors' knowledge of the area and infrastructure. Signage either in general does not have
much impact on the visitors' behavior or it needs to be designed and placed differently than it
was at Das Fest 2010.
Figure 6 Arrival flow of visitors in persons per hour. The red dotted line gives the estimation before the
event, the blue line is based on real counts.
Conclusions
Computer simulations can benefit event organization in two ways. They may investigate
issues identified beforehand, but also reveal further problems to the organizers in the course
of setting up and running the model. In the former case, data restrictions may often limit the
precision and interpretability of results. Commonly, data specific for the event, such as:
“When will the visitors choose to go where?”, or basic data which is only now being collected
(i.e. the dependence of flow on density at junctions) is missing before an event. This sets a
limit to the precision of the results which may be lower than desired. However, when using a
simulation in the style of a check list to become aware of potential problems, the result is less
dependent on such data. Here simulations can be especially helpful to set the mind on
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issues which – if they would actually lead to problems – tend to be considered a posteriori as
“obvious” by outsiders.
The usage of a simulation tool – or any other tool now and in the future – does not guarantee
or prove safety in a strict sense such that it allows a head of safety and security to just relax
and enjoy the music during their festival. Yet simulations are a way to shift the identification
and management of potential incidents from the time of the festival to its planning phase.
Thus, simulations contribute to enhancing safety and more likely keeping an event in a
manageable state. By improving the planning process they help to reduce the work load of
the security staff during the festival.
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Figure 7: The first simulations showed that with the assumed origins, routes, and destinations
counterflows immediately in the back of the ticket gates would occur (upper image, the visitors enter from
the lower right and have to pass through the half circle of security checks). This was estimated to be
realistic, as it was assumed that the visitors would not automatically and also not with information and
invitations align into the right queue according to where they want to go later. Therefore an additional
barrier was placed behind the gates (lower image) that prevented counterflows from occurring. This had
the consequence that it had to be guaranteed that all visitors aligning at S1 (the left-most security check)
were ticket owners, as they only could progress through a ticket gate and access to the free area was not
possible.
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Figure 8: Here the ticket gate which is marked with a violet circle is assumed to be out of service. All
visitors now have to follow the orange arrow.
Figure 9: If the ticket gate at the security check is broken, the second nearest ticket gate cannot alone
process the crowds and a large queue will form.
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Figure 10: Queue in front of the ticket gate (also depicted in Figure 9).
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