Crowd Safety Showstop™ Procedure

The above company provided the tour crowd safety co-ordination on behalf of Oasis at their three concerts, which took place the City of Manchester Stadium in the summer of 2005.

As part of that process Steve Allen produced a document outlining their Showstop™ Procedures to be adopted in the event of any major safety issues arising during the performance of Oasis.

Their Showstop™ document was dependant on effective communication between key personnel in the event of a situation occurring and the onus of that lay with Steve Allen.

I think it would be fair to say that there are sometimes tensions between venue management and promoters at events like ‘pop’ concerts and my experience is that some of the promises made seem never to materialise. I welcomed Steve Allen’s Showstop™ document but do confess to being a little uncertain that the contents of the Showstop™ procedure would be delivered.

This should not be seen as a reflection of Steve Allen but more to do with previous experiences with other companies.

On the Saturday concert, just as Oasis took to the stage, a massive crowd surge took place towards stage right. It could be likened to a tsunami of people and there were many thousands of spectators caught up in this. As it hit the pit barrier it dissipated left and right and the pit barrier moved forward about two feet, remarkably no one was injured.

This was immediately recognised by Steve as a major safety issue and their Showstop™ procedure was instigated.

Everything that Steve said would happen, did happen, and there were some very tense moments whilst the situation was evaluated.

The liaison between Steve and Noel Gallagher was excellent and he clearly respected his judgement.

The show was stopped for twenty minutes whilst temporary repairs were made and the show continued with the proviso that it could be stopped at any minute, depending on whether or not the repairs to the barrier held.

I was absolutely confident that if those repairs had not held, then their Showstop™ procedure would have again been implemented immediately.

There is no doubt that without the Showstop™ Procedure in place, and properly documented, then all kinds of criticisms could be levelled should an incident occur.

Not only did Steve Allen provide such a document but it was well written, easily understandable and more importantly it worked.