129 dead after fans stampede to exit Indonesian soccer match
At least 33 people have died and hundreds have been injured after hundreds of fans stormed a game at the Jakarta Stadium on Sunday (20 January 2019) after failing to earn a ticket to the game.
Hundreds also stampeded at the gates in the aftermath of the chaos caused when the first-team squad’s ticket allocation – which includes all fans who have bought tickets for the game – was announced at the stadium.
“People were saying that they wanted tickets, but they were not allowed to buy them,” Yohannes Bachtiar, managing director of the match, said in an interview with The Star. “They just continued to stand at the gates and they shouted to each other from there.”
Police said at least 33 people were found dead at the stadium in the wake of the stampede, which caused a huge mess, and said there were more than 500 injured.
As football fans were forced out of the stadium, they trampled onto the track before being trampled on by supporters of the team.
Security forces have been deployed on the stadium grounds, and the stadium has been closed so that officials can conduct a thorough inspection of the scene.
Officials have also warned stadium personnel not to allow any spectators to enter the stadium, or to do any construction work that would interfere with the investigation.
Yohannes Bachtiar of the Indonesian Soccer Football Federation, which organises the game, told The Star that they were “sorry for the loss of life”.
“This can only be regarded as a tragic event for everyone who was in the stadium and it is a very, very, very, very sad event,” he said.
I was at the match and I saw most of those fans trampled into the ground. I saw the first ambulance rush past me with an unconscious fan, and saw a lot of fans lying on the ground.
I was in the second tier and there were many people who died. There was one person who was hit by a person standing in front of him, but it wasn’t enough to kill him as he was able to go to the hospital.
I saw one fan from the first team, who was on cr
