It is 29 October 2022 in downtown Seoul, and in the popular Itaewon district, more than 100,000+ people are celebrating the first COVID-free Halloween in three years. Dance music blares from the bars, restaurants are doing a roaring trade, and even in the early evening queues are already forming outside night clubs as thousands more party-minded young people emerge from the subway system into the narrow alleys.
As the numbers grow, however, there is an uneasy feeling in the denser sections of the crowd. The South Korean capital’s police receive a first emergency call as early as 6.34PM. A pleading voice on a mobile phone tells them – “People cannot walk down the street… others are pushed upwards. It feels we are being crushed. I only just managed to escape, it is way too crowded here, you must do something! Some kind of control…”
At 9.10PM another call: “Halloween party… severe situation… people are
