Seoul tragedy: The difference between crowd crush and stampede

The tragic occasion within the South Korean capital is being described as a crowd crush or surge, which is totally different from a stampede.

A person pays tribute near the scene of the stampede during Halloween festivities, in Seoul, South Korea, October 30, 2022
An individual pays tribute close to the scene of the stampede throughout Halloween festivities, in Seoul, South Korea [Kim Hong-ji/Reuters]

At the very least 150 individuals have been killed in a crowd crush in South Korea’s capital, Seoul, with most of the victims dying of cardiac arrest, marking the deadliest of such incidents within the nation’s historical past.

The tragic occasion is being described as a crowd crush or surge, which is totally different from a stampede.

A crowd crush is when individuals are packed in a confined area and preserve pushing, inflicting the gang to fall in a “domino impact” making it onerous for individuals to rise up once more. The larger the gang, the stronger the impact of the gang crush is.

The result's that folks’s lungs don't discover sufficient area to increase, making it tough to breathe.

“As individuals wrestle to rise up, legs and arms get twisted collectively. Blood provide begins to be diminished to the mind,” Keith Nonetheless, a visiting professor of crowd science on the College of Suffolk in England, instructed NPR after 10 individuals died at a pageant in Houston final November.

“It takes 30 seconds earlier than you lose consciousness, and round about six minutes, you’re into compressive or restrictive asphyxia. That’s a typically the attributed reason behind loss of life – not crushing, however suffocation,” he added.

Halloween celebrations

The catastrophe in Seoul came about on Saturday as an enormous crowd thronged a slim alley throughout Halloween celebrations within the nightlife district of Itaewon. Witnesses’ harrowing accounts of the incident described individuals scrambling to get out of the suffocating crowd within the downhill alley as individuals ended up piling on high of each other.

About 100,000 individuals thronged the world recognized for its bars and golf equipment.

“Folks stored pushing down right into a downhill membership alley, leading to different individuals screaming and falling down like dominos,” one unidentified witness was quoted as saying by the Yonhap information company.

One of many deadliest of such incidents came about in Saudi Arabia when greater than 1,400 pilgrims died in July 1990 inside al-Muaissem tunnel close to the Muslim holy metropolis of Mecca throughout Eid al-Adha, or the Feast of Sacrifice, on the finish of the annual Hajj pilgrimage.

Such occasions might be triggered for various causes. In Indonesia final month, at the very least 130 individuals died after police fired tear fuel in a stadium the place half of the doorways have been locked, inflicting a crush on the exits.

A stampede in contrast implies that folks have area to run. It happens when a bigger group of individuals, which might be frightened or excited, run collectively in an uncontrolled solution to escape from one thing.

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