What happened to ATEEZ at HMA?

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Woke up to a whole lot of craziness about the Hanteo Music Awards and I’m trying to piece it all together.

First of all their Bouncy performance possibly had the backing track too loud? It did sound to me like they were having to shout a lot of their lines just to be heard.

Then it seems like they were really worried at times, particularly Hongjoong and Mingi were worrying and trying to take care of people possibly due to some pushing at the barricades, get them water, help someone in the crowd get to safety.

Despite it all, they won top global performer and the group artist of the year award.

And Hongjoong and San asked everyone to be safe when they were accepting awards.

Don’t even know what to think of the rumored… shitty situation. While there are supposed receipts I doubt any fan would actually admit to that online.

All in all, what a tough night for our ATEEZ as Park Jae Jung called them. As this ATINY said, “go home and rest well Captain, you worked hard today.”

[ETA] Seems that ATEEZ, aespa and other idols had to try to look after the crowd when there was dangerous pushing with a poor design of the show where the idols were in one location the fans crowded around. Really awful for them and bad show management from the event producers, the invited artists should not have to feel responsible or worry, and fans should have a safe experience.

Here’s their whole Crazy Form & Bouncy performance.

And here’s ATEEZ and aespa both trying to help fans and getting upset over the situation.

aespa’s performance shows the unbalanced crowd in the very beginning of this clip. See how everyone is crushing towards where the idols are. Still view

Seonghwa talking about a dangerous situation on live. And here’s Jongho. Comments from San. Yunho’s message and him worrying over the crowd.

Here’a aespa next to ATEEZ trying to tell the crowd to move back. And Karina speaking about it in their acceptance speech. Comments from the members on this Twitter about how they were worried about people’s safety.

I’ll continue to add more links as I find them and as ATINYs and other fans share, thank you all for helping to put the picture together of this awful night.

[ETA] This post has more links including ZB1. And this Twitter thread from a Zerose who was there for ZB1 details how the pushing in the crowd got worse and worse. Lots of videos in that one including of the poor ZB1 guys getting stressed and concerned along with ATEEZ and everyone else.

And a another version of the clip within this HMA montage of Mingi and Hongjoong and others trying to size up what was going on. And this video has more including ZB1’s Hanbin asking the crowd to please move back and more of aespa getting people water. And one fan thanking ATEEZ for protecting their safety and getting them water.

And this Hongjoong appreciation post has links to knetz and inetz showing gratitude for him & ATEEZ. And if you’d like to see HMA moments of our Captain looking fierce & smiling not stressed here you go. Plus 8turn reacting to their Bouncy performance is giving me life

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They were worried cause the crowd was all gathered on one side and ppl were pushing. The members, especially HJ and Mingi had to ask the security to do something or to give out water to ppl. Their manager apparently even pulled out a girl from the crowd.

Also, while they won two awards, they spend a lot of award speech time asking ppl to please move back and stay safe.

It was just piss poor management on the event organisers part.

Some of the members have gone on toktoq or Fromm and asked fans to stay safe and talked about how they were really concerned.

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Get this man a good long rest

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I know people want to joke about the poop.

But it’s important to know that the same thing happened during the Halloween crush, when it’s so hot and you are pushed on all sides that can seriously occur.

The idols were genuinely scared that people were going to get hurt.

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People were too crowded and it was really hot, they were struggling to stay on their feet in areas of the standing crowd from what I heard. I think they were worried about people fainting or getting crushed

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oh my gosh i feel nauseated and so so much sympathy for everyone here, staff and artists. same as i did reading about itaewon… fans are crazy. even if there was a “code brown”, there’s just so so many people around who are literally getting depleted of oxygen, you can’t breathe or stand properly, let alone the heat.

i feel so bad for artists like ateez and (it seems) karina whose award show, which is sposed to be fun, got interrupted and they had to basically do the venue managements job and tell the staff to get them water and try to get them to back up. even in their speeches, but props to ateez’s staff taking action pulling the girl out. the crowd management just should have been better imo.

ik if i was there i would have fainted dead away almost immediately when the crowd started pushing, so i can see why this was such a huge issue

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The fact that several members had lives and fromm messaging, that they went to the pop up store and released pics of those as well as gave us 2 Choi couple tiktoks in one night, makes me think even they know how bad this was and are trying to help us calm down.

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Joong handled the situation so well. Shame is that he even had to in the first place. He’s always been a man of act and he’s so considerate and pro-active . I hope they feel a little more relieved from the stress by now… :pensive_face: And poor those fans who had to encounter such conditions and didn’t ask to be a part of any conflict.

Edit: Thank you for updating links with more context for us, it’s much needed and so kind of you!

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It still baffles me that the artists themselves were having to get so involved in the crowd control, some of the ateez members looked like they were damn near yelling at security to help people. The artists shouldn’t have had to take moments out of their acceptance speeches to beg the crowd to spread out and stop rushing forward at the barricade. I saw more pictures and videos of ateez and other artists pointing to people in the crowd to get security to go to them than I did of the artists actually enjoying the performances. I don’t think I saw any fansite photos from last night where an ateez member was actually smiling.

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It was just a hot mess with the actual venue security having to receive pointers on how to handle the crowd from the artists meanwhile, ateez staff and ateez security had to pull out someone that fainted from the crowd. It was all very lacklustre.

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Not the Ateez and Aespa crumbs we deserved ): I really hope the fans are all okay… And I hope the artists get some rest. Cant imagine the stress so soon after the Halloween crush.

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Thank you for putting this all together in one place

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The backing track was way too loud and ateez always take that as a challenge even in the best of circumstances, but you could tell they were putting every ounce of their frustration with the event into it on this, too.

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Thanks for compiling this OP. What a scary situation all around, I hope everyone is unhurt.

I just wanted to add that I’ve seen a few snide comments on social media about idols having to make security do their jobs, that they were standing by just watching etc. But from the various clips linked in this post, that didn’t seem to be the case. What I saw were security guards who looked overwhelmed and were trying their best to control the crowd. The idols were on an elevated platform and thus had a better line of sight to direct security to pass out water bottles or handle problem spots where needed.

This situation was regrettable but it’s not the sole fault of any individual. There were multiple factors that led to this (idol seating location, distance of that platform from stage, poor crowd control protocols etc) and to pretend that it would have been prevented if security had just “done their jobs” prevents us from learning lessons to avoid similar situations in the future.

Fans are rightfully worried about the distress that their idols must have felt, but let’s not forget that the Itaewon tragedy was a national one. I’m sure it must have been no less distressing for the security guards themselves too.

This is not directed at OP, btw, I’m just latching onto your post since it’s the nexus for discussing this issue.

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Thank goodness for ATEEZ and aespa actually being decent human beings. What were the organisers thinking :sob:

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Thanks for compiling.

The organizer has poor planning, just hoping this situation don’t repeat again…

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Is this the same person who helped carry the girl in the other video?

https://twitter.com/dudnwlsdlcjs2/status/1759248185049166253?t=ydHBDpUHKZ12Rsm1czkPaQ&s=19

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Love that bouncy performance when they were a shouting over the backing track

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That is really, really outrageous. The blame belongs to the event organizers. The groups are there to perform and not to do crowd control. It is a wonder Ateez could focus on their performance at all. What total disregard for the safety of the audience and the group. I am so steamed about this!

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Oh my goodness gracious…I’m literally at a loss for words for what I’m reading in these comments of what happened. I haven’t even seen the performance yet and I’m scared to watch :fearful: I hope everyone - Ateez, the people in the crowds especially, and the groups performing / everyone there for the award show are OK…whew.