LADY GAGA

[Skizz]

Unless you were in the Arena for The Streets, you will probably know about the massive crush en route from the 4Music stage to the Arena to these sets and into the 4Music area from The Arena too.

Anyone else think that was piss poor event management? Got in in the end but it's not the point people got seriously hurt!!

[are.we.human]

Agreed!! but in the end so worth it!!! She was amazing!

[chilisara]

we managed to get there from the campsite.... had popped back after James - prob a good thing then!

She had already started tho so missed paparazzi but seeing the big 2 was what we wanted and we managed - mental in there tho.... she really shoulda been on one of the stages

[daedge]

Unless you were in the Arena for The Streets, you will probably know about the massive crush en route from the 4Music stage to the Arena to these sets and into the 4Music area from The Arena too.

Anyone else think that was piss poor event management? Got in in the end but it's not the point people got seriously hurt!!

[RaveyRaveyBen]

i was in The Arena since Ladyhawke and by the time the Streets came on i was 3 rows from the front...getting crushed! Girls kept passing out and the bottle war was annoying especially because of the rowdy steroid pumping gym monkeys who kept singing 'Lets have it' resulted in the people around them getting bottled with god knows what! Then Gaga came on and MGMT and it was mental! Im 6ft 3 and i was struggling to breath!

[vik74]

Very poor management. We were about 5 rows back when they opened the gates, once you started moving forward there was no way back. You could start to feel yourself getting crushed and thinking I hope i don't trip over here cause no chance of getting back up. I was scared and I'm a 16.5st bloke. They should have a better system than trying to let a couple of thousand people who have been waiting nearly 30mins. through a gap the size of two garage doors. The gap between The Arena and rest of the site is far two small for two way traffic.

I don't see why they didn't put The Streets in a slot on the V stage and Lady Gaga on slightly earlier. There wouldn't have been a massive crush at the start of Lady Gaga and more time to get to the V stage for Snow Patrol after Lady Gaga. We didn't bother with Snow patrol cause It would have taken ages to get all the way across and I saw that gap back through gates getting even smaller the more I looked at it. And the thought of 80,000 people on the other side filled me with dread. We decided to leave early and had no problems getting out of the car park.

We've decided to go next year but we'll be heading for Staffs cause I just didn't like the Chelmsford layout, too many pinch points between stages for my liking.

On the plus side I had a great day on Saturday, Sunday was a let down for me and I was glad to be safely heading home in my car at the end of the night.

I hope someone from the event mismanagement read these types of forums cause I'm sure it's the only way to get our points across about what really happens out there.

Also........No where near enough toilets. Near The Arena tent they had about 30 portaloos and 10 urinals. No wonder the blokes where pissin up against the fences. By late afternoon so where the girls.

[vik74]

Unless you were in the Arena for The Streets, you will probably know about the massive crush en route from the 4Music stage to the Arena to these sets and into the 4Music area from The Arena too.

Anyone else think that was piss poor event management? Got in in the end but it's not the point people got seriously hurt!!

[samboka]

It was scary for the little people, im 5 foot and went to see the streets, having been there the previous day for Happy Mondays I knew what the layout was like but this was totally diffrent on day two, too many people everywhere, sitting down, getting trampled on. they shut the gates so i lost my other half and it was over an hour before i could make contact with him again as teh network was so shit, i was scared at this point.

i felt very unsafe and crushed, people everywhere, no crowd control from staff and not enough space for so many people to move from stage to stage.

i agree the streets should have been on the V4 stage as there was defo the crowd for it.

i was glad to get out of there after gaga even though i missed 20 mins of Snow Patrol.

It was my first festival so I cannot benchmark it against

sam

[vik74]

It was scary for the little people, im 5 foot and went to see the streets, having been there the previous day for Happy Mondays I knew what the layout was like but this was totally diffrent on day two, too many people everywhere, sitting down, getting trampled on. they shut the gates so i lost my other half and it was over an hour before i could make contact with him again as teh network was so shit, i was scared at this point.

i felt very unsafe and crushed, people everywhere, no crowd control from staff and not enough space for so many people to move from stage to stage.

i agree the streets should have been on the V4 stage as there was defo the crowd for it.

i was glad to get out of there after gaga even though i missed 20 mins of Snow Patrol.

It was my first festival so I cannot benchmark it against

sam

[shamblesuk]

yeah I'm just under 5ft too and I also saw a few children with parents coming through the crush as well, it was just so much busier sunday i'd be interested to know what the official capacity was as everyone is scanned in so there must be a figure somewhere! why they put it behind gates in the first place is a mystery, its my 3rd v chelmsford and has put me off I was going to let my daughter go next year when she is but am having a bit of a re-think.

[vik74]

I was sat watching it all and it looked terrible, I thought the crush at the front of Pendulum was bad!

What's the point in those stupid doors anyway?

[natalie_ball]

Unless you were in the Arena for The Streets, you will probably know about the massive crush en route from the 4Music stage to the Arena to these sets and into the 4Music area from The Arena too.

Anyone else think that was piss poor event management? Got in in the end but it's not the point people got seriously hurt!!

[Skizz]

I spoke to one of the heads of security who was watching the crush from afar, he said he'd be "very surprised" if they opened the gates again before GaGa performed, to which I replied why have you not got more security here to get people away from the gates...he then went very silent.

He also said the Arena had a capacity of 12,000 people and at The Streets there were approximately 18,000 people there, but no "major incidents" no?

I also asked why they would put such popular acts in one of the smallest areas, he said that apparently some of the acts ask that they are put on the smaller stages, GaGa this would possibly make sense for but I don't see Mike Skinner saying no to performing in front of 20,000+ on 4Music stage or 25,000+ on the V Stage, do you?

They were just idiots about it all, security weren't really bothered, they are glamorised traffic wardens in orange coats they could not give less of a shit about people's safety.

[sjc0102]

i was in The Arena since Ladyhawke and by the time the Streets came on i was 3 rows from the front...getting crushed! Girls kept passing out and the bottle war was annoying especially because of the rowdy steroid pumping gym monkeys who kept singing 'Lets have it' resulted in the people around them getting bottled with god knows what! Then Gaga came on and MGMT and it was mental! Im 6ft 3 and i was struggling to breath!

[trafford12]

why would you wonna get crushed to see a she he wierdo some pppzzz must like that sort of thing aaaaahttp:

[trafford12]

why would you wonna get crushed to see a she he wierdo some pppzzz must like that sort of thing aaaaa

[Peterborough chick]

I was on the other side of the fence, wanted to see The Enemy so i left the Streets about half way through and that was when they had started redirecting people to go out the other side of the field and re-enter the site from a different entrance. But since I got in on a weekend (without camping) ticket i didnt have a wristband. I asked one security guy if they would let me back in and he said yes, theyd radiod through, so went to the 'out' gate and asked again and he said he wasnt sure. I then asked him that if i tried to get in the other side and failed, could i come ack to him personally, so that he would let me in. He said no.(!)

So i went back to the barricade and had to wait with everyone. Felt penned in like animals. Even the police were there on the side lines but did nothing to diffuse the situation. They only said that it was down to the private security company.

Obviouly they could not see that the queue to get out was getting worse and worse and people were getting angry, we could hear the Enemy playing! I was worried I was going to get trampled as I was on my own too.

Eventually there was a massive stampede and the security guys had no choice but to let us through.

I just don't understand that if they were trying to empty that section of the field why didnt they let us out?!!!