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Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Safety inquiry over JLS gig crush

A safety expert is to be brought in to examine how about 60 people got injured in a crowd surge at a free concert during a Christmas event in Birmingham.

The crush, which left four people in hospital, happened as pop group JLS performed at Millennium Point.

Council chiefs said they had been prepared for 20,000 but many more turned up.

The city council apologised for what happened and said there would be an inquiry into the crowd control.

Steve Hollingworth from the council said: "I am sure a lot of people were frightened when the surge happened."

The event had been due to feature several other acts, including Calvin Harris, Tinchy Stryder, Natalie Imbruglia and X-Factor winner Alexandra Burke.

But the concert was stopped after the chaotic scenes towards the end of JLS's performance.

Heavy criticism

As crowds surged to get into the packed square barriers gave way, injuring scores of people.

Organisers of the event, which was not ticketed, have faced heavy criticism.

But Ch Supt Andy Nicholson of West Midlands Police said ticketed events could themselves lead to extra problems.

"You have to have people on the barriers to check those tickets, to deal people just turning up, the forgery of tickets - everything that goes with a ticketed event.

"It perhaps requires more people to be brought in just actually to manage tickets, as opposed to managing safety and security which has to be our primary focus."

Birmingham City Council said it had never had to cancel events before and everything possible had been done to plan for Saturday's gathering.

A spokesman said a similar event would not be held at Millennium Point next year - not because of the crush, but because a car park was being created.

A new city park is being built around part of the area.

The spokesman said similar events, including concerts by Lemar, The Sugababes, Simon Webbe, Girls Aloud and Leona Lewis, had taken place at Millennium Point in the past without any problems.

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