Mayor Eric Adams says city will take action against Electric Zoo Festival organizers
NEW YORK -- Mayor Eric Adams says the city will take action against the organizers of the Electric Zoo Music Festival.
Days after this year's festival, some concertgoers are still reeling from the chaos, and the mayor and NYPD are also unhappy with the way organizers handled the event.
It was a scary scene on Randall's Island on Sunday. Festivalgoers charged the front gate after being told the venue was at capacity.
"It was really scary," festivalgoer Jillian Scanio said.
"The NYPD was on the scene. You had thousands of people who were not allowed to enter the location because of over ticket sales, and we handled the influx appropriately," the mayor said.
Scanio flew in from the West Coast. A regular at concerts and festivals, it was her first time visiting New York and Electric Zoo.
"It was just a mess," she said.
As she was heading out the door Friday, she found out on social media that day one of the festival had been canceled. Electric Zoo officials said they were unable to get the stage set up in time, blaming global supply chain problems.
Saturday, the festival started two hours late, resulting in some acts being canceled.
By Sunday, organizers posted that the venue reached capacity earlier than anticipated and that people should refrain from attending, but hundreds of people rushed the gates.
"I was up on the VIP platform and just looking out over the sea of people, just in front of me and behind me, I was like, I don't know how or if I'm going to get out of here," Scanio said.
"We had 88,000 people attend over capacity," NYPD Chief of Patrol John Chell said.
Scanio started to panic. The 22-year-old student texted her mom, fearful she may die there.
"It was scary. I cried. I ended up going into the med tent. I was shaking. They took my blood pressure and it was like 196/105," she said.
Representatives for the festival sent CBS New York the following statement Tuesday:
"The vast majority of Electric Zoo attendees had a great experience, but our job is to make sure everyone's experience is phenomenal. We'll be working closely with our partners to review the planning and execution of the event from start to finish."
In the meantime, city officials say drone technology was critical in making split second decisions on crowd management.
"We were able to get our drone truck up to that location in about 10 minutes," NYPD Assistant Commissioner Kaz Daughtry said.
"It's unfortunate organizers wanted to turn our city into a zoo, and we were not going to allow that to happen. We will be dealing with them in the next few days based on their behavior and actions," Adams said.
Organizers say they've started reaching out to attendees about refunds, but Scanio tells us she was only partially refunded for Friday.
