30 injured after Ferris wheel fire at festival near Leipzig

The police spokeswoman was initially unable to comment on the information. She added that four police officers were among the wounded.

The cause of the fire remained unclear at first until the evening. First, one gondola of the Ferris wheel caught fire around 9 p.m. The fire then spread to the second gondola. Both were completely destroyed by the fire.

Festival visitor Guido from Cologne reported that the Ferris wheel suddenly moved faster. Then the burning gondola was at the top. “Then there was a deathly silence,” said the 58-year-old.

When the first flames appeared, rapper Ski Agu, 26, was on stage. Shortly after, he wrote on his Instagram story: “I am absolutely horrified and shocked by the Ferris wheel fire during my show at Highfield. I was told straight away that I would not cancel the show under any circumstances, but I will. First, the dialogue needs to stay with you so there is no mass panic.”

The priority was to ensure the situation didn’t get any worse. Fortunately, that worked too. “Thank you all for staying calm and possibly preventing something worse from happening.” The decisive factor here was the work of the rescue workers who responded quickly. “Thank you so much for your service!! I hope you feel better soon,” wrote the Berlin rapper, whose real name is August Jan Diederich and whose brand is a pair of ski goggles.

Little by little, people were being removed from the Ferris wheel, according to those present. A dpa reporter at the scene described the two damaged rides as completely burned. A fire department spokesman told dpa about 30 minutes after the fire broke out that the situation was now under control.

The festival was then halted at Störmthaler See, a large rock and pop festival with around 30,000 visitors. About an hour after the fire broke out, at around 10 p.m., there was an announcement on stage to visitors that those affected were fine – and that the festival should continue with the Krue performance. And around 11 p.m. the program actually continued.

After the fire, festival-goer Ricky, who had come from the Harz mountains, was initially hesitant about whether the concerts should go ahead. The 27-year-old found the mood gloomy. But he praised the organisers for their approach: “There were clear announcements and we knew what had happened.”

Bastian, from Leipzig, also said rescue workers arrived quickly. The 33-year-old said he felt many visitors were now drawn to their tents, preferring to end the evening there to talk about what they had been through.

Stefanie, 40, from Werdau in Saxony, was particularly shocked. According to her own statements, she had been on the Ferris wheel just minutes before the fire broke out. “We smelled plastic and thought it was coming from the campsite,” she said. When she saw the flames on the gondola, she couldn’t believe how close she had come to escaping.