Last Updated: Tuesday, August 17, 2010 5 Years Since The Death Of Jessica Michalik At Big Day Out Updated: Thursday, January 26, 2006 Jessica, 15, a victim of reckless crowd management at the Big Day Out in Sydney. Photo: Michalik family. The Big Day Out traveling rock festival in Australia and New Zealand had gained the status as one of the most reckless rock festivals in the world by Crowd Management Strategies even before January 26, 2001. Five years ago today, the chaotic crowd scene tolerated by promoter Creative Entertainment (Ken West and Vivien Lees) and their security firm Australian Event Protection--and the over the top performance style of Limp Bizket--cost Jessica Michalik,15, her life. She was crushed to death in a surging swirling festival seating mosh environment. Immediately, a rumor was spread by event insiders that the young girl was under the influence of drugs. That proved patently false. Others tried to blame the crowd of young rockers. Sydney media and rock writers also played a part in the disaster. For years they ignored the reckless Big Day Out crowd environment, or worse, hyped it. Finger pointing immediately turned ugly between Creative Entertainment and Limp Bizkit, the band playing at the time of Jessica’s death. Each accused the other for the disaster. The promoter and its security firm blamed the band for not cooperating as the crowd spun out of control. The band blamed the promoter and it security firm for not heeding their warnings that more crowd safety and security precautions were needed for the Sydney show, especially after a near crowd disaster during the band’s set in Auckland just a week earlier. Jessica’s death might have been quickly forgotten had it not been for her parents, especially her father, George. His sorrow took him on a personal journey around the world in search of answers to his daughter’s death. He spoke with anyone who would listen to him and listened to anyone who would talk to him—rock fans, the media, Crowd Management Strategies, Limp Bizkit, Creative Entertainment, Australian Concert Event Security, Venue & Event Management Services, government officials—anyone. A year after the Roskilde Festival tragedy, where nine fans were crushed to death during the Pearl Jam set, Mr. Michalik was in Denmark observing the festival’s new safety procedures and taking notes. At the same time, Mr. Michalik dogged Creative Entertainment. The promoter was already under great pressure to clean up its act for the 2002 Big Day Out festival. To do so, it took a page from the Roskilde Festival organizers and instituted sweeping crowd safety procedures, including the adoption of most of Crowd Management Strategies’ (CMS)mosher-friendly” guidelines, developing its own version of CMS’ You and the Festival Crowd safety brochure produced for Roskilde and incorporating other existing crowd safety techniques and strategies from Australian and English crowd experts. So persistent was Mr. Michalik, that an inquest was established to investigate Jessica’s death. The inquest also pitted crowd safety and security experts against each other. Highly respected Australian crowd safety expert Andrew Tatrai of Australia and England’s respected crowd safety expert Michael Upton seemed unable to agree on causation. Mr. Upton represented the interests of the Big Day Out promoter and security company. Mr. Tatrai, was offering his independent testimony, with certain insights having previously worked on the Big Day Out until he claims he thought it unsafe. Even though Mr. Upton had viewed footage of the crowd on or about the time of the tragedy, and even though he had read eyewitness accounts of the crowd on or about the time of the tragedy, and even though Mr. Upton had during his own career witnessed two tragic concert crowd crushes that took the lives of three fans, and even though Mr. Upton is well versed on crowd dynamics, he would not draw a conclusion about the cause of Jessica’s death. This was something that the coroner thought rather astonishing and she wrote so in her final report: “Mr. Upton can’t proffer an opinion as to how or why Jessica came to be on the ground. There is overwhelming evidence that the crowd density was NOT [coroner’s emphasis] acceptable…There is also overwhelming evidence that crowd surges pushed people over and because of the critical crowd density, people could not get up…[I]ndeed, the crowd density level was dangerous to say the least.” (page 15) "Relaying [on eyewitness] accounts was necessary, because there appears to be a reluctance on the part of the promoters and Mr. Upton to accept that the situation on that day was completely unacceptable. Crowd safety is of paramount importance, it was a nightmare for many patrons...It is obvious to everyone who views the videotape that people are squashed and jostled and at times are fighting for survival. A fight Jessica Michalik lost." (page 16) When the inquest completed its investigation in 2001, it was up to Senior Deputy State Coroner Jacqueline M. Milledge to sort things out. Coroner Milledge included in her report ten recommendations to make Australian festivals and concerts safer. She called them “The Jessica Recommendations.” Half a decade later, these safeguards have not been adopted by national or local authorities. A significant failing that may yet prove tragic. The one glaring failure of the inquest was its inability to identify the parties responsible for Jessica’s death. An uncompromising read of the testimony along with the awareness of documented crowd safety procedures designed to prevent concert crowd crushes, made it reasonably easy to identify those responsible for the negligence that led to Jessica's death. Last July, Mr. Michalik settled a civil lawsuit against Creative Entertainment, Australian Event Protection and Australasian Event Services, the builder of Big Day Out’s front stage barrier system. (Ms. Michalik initiated her own lawsuit against Limp Bizkit. That case was dismissed.) The Big Day Out is in full swing now, but controversy still surrounds the festival. In Sydney today, festival medics reported 553 "casualties" during the all day event. Eight people were sent to the hospital. [ home ][ crowdcafe ][ new ][ crowdshop ][ contact ] Crowd Management Strategies © 1997 - 2006. All rights reserved. Crowdsafe is a registered trademark of Crowd Management Strategies © 2006.