STATEMENT ON BARRIER COLLAPSE BLUR GIG IN BLACKPOOL

This morning Prolyte Group was informed on a barrier collapse during a Blur concert in Blackpool. Blur's gig at Blackpool's Empress Ballroom in Blackpool had to be halted on Wednesday when a barrier in front of the stage gave way. 

Unfortunately, the barriers involved in this accident are Prolyte barriers; a hired in rental company installed the barriers in the venue. From information Prolyte Group has been able to retrieve from companies and persons involved in the accident, the fault is not in the barrier itself, as Singer Damon Albarn stated*.

As Product Manager Eric Laanstra states: “Leaving out these vital bolts can seriously affect the strength and stability of the barriers. The system is just not complete without these and should never have been used in this condition”.

This unfortunate accident proves again that the precise and correct set up and build of systems like these crowd barriers is paramount. Each system should be built following the instructions from the manual and be checked before use by a competent staff member. Even though a full risk analysis on the technical build was made before the gig, as requested by the organising company, this vital point was overseen during the built up.

“We can’t emphasize enough the importance of building your systems in a correct way – this again shows that check, check and double check should be part of every build” continues Eric Laanstra, we like to invite the involved rental company for a product training, so this can be prevented”.

Prolyte Group would like to thank both Blur and the Empress Ballroom front of house management for their accurate and very responsible behaviour, stopping mid-song and halting the show, thereby putting the safety of the audience first.

Source: http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-33091901

Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CS56D_Hdg90

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