On Stage Lighting: This last month or so, it’s been a regular event: The reporting of a temporary structure failure at a show, leading to serious injury and loss of life. In recent years this kind of news is no longer unheard of, either during a build or a show, something in a roof support or rigging system fails and sets off a chain of events that is putting people in danger.
There has been, and will be, a lot of speculation about specific recent failures, much of it temporal conjecture and even more of it political wriggling, blame and avoidance. Once the bereaved have been comforted, scapegoats cited (like the Weather Gods), legal proceedings done and lip service paid to future event safety, there is the horrific possibility that the “show will go on.”
2 comments:
The rigging and portable staging aspects of our industry have a significant lack of oversight and an even more scary lack of standardized certifications. There are many riggers and portable staging companies that hire vastly under qualified people in an attempt to get the lowest bid on a project or tour. The idea of the weekend warrior who can come out and help load in a major tour’s staging is one that is seen in venues across the country. Also local IATSE unions’ lack of requirements of safety certifications or any major standardized training makes the entertainment world a major safety risk. As the article states the industry is still in its beginning stages and as such there is a serious lack of oversight and training. All of these disasters have elements that were unavoidable however with the addition of standard operating procedures for cancellation of events due to unsafe conditions some of the staging collapses could have been avoided. Also to blame is the hubris of some technicians who underestimate natural forces and their volatile and unpredictable nature. Through regulation, standardization and mandatory maintenance the risk of catastrophic failures could be significantly reduced.
This article has some great points about temporary Staging. I worked for a staging company last summer and there are not a lot of safety procedures that are in place, safety does not seem a focus. I find that they should have a set of laws or rules that say that you must have these procedures in place or you will get shut down and possibly fined. There should be a regulator that should have inspection like theaters have with fire and they have to pass them or you can not open the event. With all the new things that are being introduced to the staging world I feel that there needs to be a process that gets approved to be use, and even labeled inspected. I hope that the stage industry puts some of these safeguards into effect in the future.
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