CMU School of Drama


Monday, September 21, 2020

Couple die in theatre tragedy at performance dedicated to Wuhan medical workers who fought coronavirus

South China Morning Post: A Wuhan nurse and her husband were killed in a tragic accident during a local theatre performance celebrating frontline medical workers
and China’s victory against the Covid-19 pandemic
, the Wuhan city government said.

Almost two weeks after the accident, the Wuchang district government in Wuhan posted its first information about the incident that occurred about 9pm on September 6 at the Han Show Theatre, a venue run by the Wuhan Wanda Dragone Performing Arts Company.

2 comments:

Reiley Nymeyer said...

Reading this article felt like a fever dream. Han Show Theatre, a venue run by the Wuhan Wanda Dragone Performing Arts Company, held a celebratory performance for Wuhan nurses and doctors who fought on the front lines against the Coronavirus. A couple, a nurse and her husband, passed during this celebration.

There are 2000 seats in this venue, 415 were designed to rotate. “some seats move like a fan opening and closing, to allow the best view of onstage effects.”

The show was to open back on September 10th, but holding two special events beforehand for Wuhan medical workers.

According to a post on Weibo, the couple’s son slipped under the rotating seat during the show, and in attempt to rescue the boy were “crushed to death by the rotating chairs.” Gruesome.

What the real outrage is not how this happened in the first place, (which is deserving of an outrage), but that it took the Wuhan government 2 weeks to make the incident public and why so little information on this has been published.

This is a true tragedy that could have been avoided if safety measures weren’t skipped over. I can only feel sorrow.

DJ L. said...

While I understand why people would be upset that the incident hadn't been made public for a couple weeks and the more information about it hasn't been released, I also understand why something like this happens. Often, government agencies don't want incidents made public until enough information is gathered, and a cause can properly be determined. Working in public safety I really understand where this is coming from. That being said, it is interesting that there was no public information released at all. Even just a "Unfortunately, last night there was a tragic event that occurred during the performance...we are currently investigation what happened..etc." I am very interesting in seeing how these chairs "malfunctioned" so terribly that it killed someone. Either way, what matters most at this point is the exact cause of the incident is determined, and measures are put in place to ensure an incident with these chairs never happens again.