More than a month after Astroworld, the Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences in Houston released their report concerning the deaths of ten concert-goers. In the report, the Institute found that all ten victims died of compression asphyxia. This is when a massive amount of force and weight is put on a person’s body. Unable to properly breathe, the pressure eventually suffocates the person.
The official report on Astroworld fatalities
Speaking to KHOU 11, Dr. George W. Williams of UT Health Houston went into detail on the effects of compression asphyxia. “When we have compression asphyxiation, you’re looking at so much force – hundreds of pounds of force outside the chest — to where there’s force outside the chest emptying the chest,” the doctor said. “When there’s barely standing room and you’re shoulder-to-shoulder with people both in the front and the back, all it takes is one person tripping on a rock or pushing forward to where you get a domino effect and one person pushes another and the next and the next. And all that collective weight can end up on just a few people.”
In a report obtained by Variety, it was found that one victim’s death had other contributing causes. 27-year-old Mirza Danish Baig ingested cocaine, methamphetamine, and ethanol. The report finds that the toxic effects of these drugs played a part in her death. Nonetheless, she too died of compression asphyxia.
Travis Scott’s onslaught continues
These reports come out at an increasingly brutal time for Astroworld organizer and headliner Travis Scott. Already facing hundreds of lawsuits, the 29-year-old now faces possible exposure by a former label signee. Latin singer Malu Trevejo, briefly signed on Scott’s Cactus Jack Records, evidently left the company in early November. However, the 19-year-old now claims she wants to be let out of the contract, stating in an Instagram story: “let me out of the contract don’t wanna expose behind the scenes sh*t so just let me out of it.”
Garrett C. Owen
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