Four years ago Wednesday, a crowd surge at the Astroworld Festival in Houston led to the deaths of 10 people. After the tragedy, the family of one of the victims created a foundation that holds crowd safety training around the world, including at a recent event in Houston.
The Pink Bows Foundation was created in May 2022 by the Dubiski family to honor Madison Dubiski, a 23-year-old Houston-area resident who died at the Astroworld Festival. One of the Pink Bows Foundation’s main initiatives was the creation of the “Showstop Procedure,” which began training professionals worldwide earlier this year.
On Monday, the foundation hosted training in Houston with representatives from the Houston and Pasadena police departments, the Houston Livestock Show & Rodeo, Live Nation Productions and the Duke University athletic department.
Brian Dubiski, Madison's father, said the family decided to create the Showstop Procedure after finding that no similar training existed for how to properly stop a show during an emergency.
"It's the only accredited course for show stop training," he said. "It's the only globalized accredited course for this specific vertical in crowd safety. We've trained people all over the world. We've trained some of the biggest music festivals in the world, including Europe."
Since launching the program in March, the foundation has trained more than 400 event professionals worldwide. Trainees have included members of the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) and the London Metropolitan Police. The longterm goal of the foundation is to establish a global standard for crowd safety.
Michelle Dubiski, Madison's mother, said the reception from professionals has been exceptional.
"I think everybody ... they assume these [procedures] are already in place," Michelle said. "So, it seems super elementary, but it's actually something that everybody is wrapping their arms around, from promoters to any industry leaders."
On the night of Friday, Nov. 5, 2021, a crowd of 50,000 people gathered at NRG Park for the Astroworld Festival hosted by Houston rapper Travis Scott. During Scott's performance, the crowd began to surge, causing hundreds of injuries, eight deaths, and 25 hospitalizations. In the days that followed, two of the hospitalized victims died. The ages of the victims ranged from 9 to 27.
Madison was one of the eight victims who died at NRG Park that night.
Steve Allen has over 30 years of experience in event management and safety, and was an expert witness in one of the dozens of lawsuits that followed the Astroworld crowd crush. Allen was also one of the architects behind the development of the Showstop Procedure, and he leads the training courses held by the foundation.
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Allen said what happened at Astroworld is the exact kind of emergency the training has been developed to stop.
"When we say stopping shows, we've stopped the performance," Allen said. "That doesn't mean you're canceling the show. You're stopping the performance as an emergency intervention measure to regain control of the incident, to prevent that from turning into a major incident with tragic outcomes."
During the approximately three-hour-long course, participants are taught how to implement a "decision-making architecture" to allow for effective and clear communication between the different parties involved in a given event.
One of the key parts of the training includes providing participants with different scenarios — from major sporting events to concerts. The participants are then tasked with not only creating a plan for how to stop a show, but also for how to communicate and effectively implement that stop with the assistance of the performers, venue hosts, and local law enforcement and first responders.
Allen described the Showstop Procedure as a sort of backup measure that can be implemented whenever other safeguards fail.
"This is that emergency intervention measure, similar to a reserve parachute in effect," he said. "Your main chute fails, and you deploy your reserve chute. And it's just that extra level of care that’s much needed."
One of the participants in the Monday training was Scott Davidson, a crowd-safety expert featured in Netflix's "Trainwreck: The Astroworld Tragedy."
Davison said the training in Houston comes at an important time as the city plans to host seven soccer matches next summer as part of the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
"It's a tremendous logistical undertaking and there are some really great people working behind the scenes to help make sure that everybody can get there safely and efficiently," Davison said. "I think that this laser-guided training is intended to equip and empower that part of the process to run its course, and history has proven what can happen if there is a lack of clarity, a lack of courage to make that move."
The Dubiski family said turning the tragedy of Madison's death into action is what she would have done had the tables been turned. Michelle said the Pink Bows Foundation is not just to honor Madison's life, but all the lives that were affected four years ago.
"I know there's a lot of emphasis and attention, when there’s a tragedy, on the deaths," Michelle said. "The people that go through a horrific tragedy like this, that have survived, have to get up every single day and figure out how to put one foot in front of the other. And so what we do is not just because of what happened with our daughter. It's for those that also went through this horrific tragedy and survived."
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