A near tragedy...and a lesson learned.
22 replies
Paganforum_veteranOPThis past Friday night we headlined the Chance Theater in Poughkeepsie, NY again. As we always do, we used our flashpots at the start of the show. This time though, instead of using two we used four.
The ceilings in the place are well over 50 feet high, so we never expected anything to be dangerous. Well...wrong. The four flashes went off, and they looked SPECTACULAR.
Then, during the second song of the set - ironically named "The Burning Times" - my guitarist comes to me and asks if I smelled anything burning. Looking around the stage we saw nothing, so we kept playing.
All of a sudden right near the end of the song, the fire suppression system went off, bathing the band, our equipment, and the entire stage in chemical.
Apparently, sparks from the pots ignited an ancient hemp rope along the back wall. The flames went up the rope and into the vent system, causing pieces of foam to start falling on the stage. Luckily they had the system in place, cause it put the fire out, but unfortunately the brunt of the blast hit our drummer directly in the face.
Troopers to the end...he went out the stage door to dry heave for a few minutes, then returned and we soldiered through the rest of our set on a stage that looked like the last days of Pompei.
It was only afterward that we found out how lucky we were. The vent stage right was the one that caught fire. Had it been the one on stage left, the system couldn't have reached it and we'd have been the new "Great White".
The flashpots have been retired, and we learned a valuable lesson...no matter HOW safe a company tells you their product is, there's always that one in a million chance that something can go wrong.
We were just happy that no one was hurt or worse, and that alot of our fans actually stuck around through the firestorm. We all have to bring a compressor to our studio now and get the chemical out of all our equipment, but that's a small price to pay considering what could have happened.
The video will be up on youtube soon....
".. hell you even have a fireman who rubs his balls on another mans head for three hours a week.. show some class, don't make fun of us poor Dolphins fans. :shifty:" ~ cnc66
"There is no sweeter nectar, than the misery riddled tears of Jets fans." ~ Finascious D
padre31luxury_boxFortunate indeed Bro, there are so many variables when you use those things indoors, heck James Hetfield turned his forearm into a blow torch by wandering around one of those things on stage.
anlgpNew Memberas you know glad to hear everything's ok
"A man's suffering is similar to the behavior of gas. If a certain quantity of gas is pumped into an empty chamber, it will fill the chamber completely and evenly, no matter how big the chamber. Thus, suffering completely fills the human soul and conscious mind, no matter whether the suffering great or little. Therefore, the "size" of human suffering is absolutely relative." - Viktor Frankl
KillerphinsNew Memberyou didnt learn anything from the great white fire
using pyrotechnics in small venues is a disaster
the second you smelled something burning you should have stopped the show and cleared the room
continuing the show is not worth it
glad no one was hurt bro
Fin Fan In Caliluxury_boxBro I am glad to hear everyone was safe.
Rest in peace bigbry and dolphin debby!
anlgpNew Member"Killerphins wrote:
you didnt learn anything from the great white fire
using pyrotechnics in small venues is a disaster
the second you smelled something burning you should have stopped the show and cleared the room
continuing the show is not worth it
glad no one was hurt bro
he kinda covered that in the original thread when he said looking around the stage they saw nothing burning. i highly doubt they continue the show if they realize something is burning.
come on now.
"A man's suffering is similar to the behavior of gas. If a certain quantity of gas is pumped into an empty chamber, it will fill the chamber completely and evenly, no matter how big the chamber. Thus, suffering completely fills the human soul and conscious mind, no matter whether the suffering great or little. Therefore, the "size" of human suffering is absolutely relative." - Viktor Frankl
Paganforum_veteranTo clarify something...this was not pyro that we were using. It was a simple flash. Ever see those old movies when a photographer would take a photo and they had the powdered flash? Same principle.
Also, Great White used arena sized pyro in a club where the ceiling was a foot over their heads. The ceilings at the Chance are at least 50 feet high, and we've been using these flashes there for years. One in a million happening...but it happened.
Had we known something was on fire we'd certainly have stopped the show. No one in the audience even knew. It was about 30 feet over our heads.
Also...when the extinguishers went off, the fire was out. Our drummer stopped to go outside and heave, so we DID stop. When he came back in the threat was over, so we continued our set.
".. hell you even have a fireman who rubs his balls on another mans head for three hours a week.. show some class, don't make fun of us poor Dolphins fans. :shifty:" ~ cnc66
"There is no sweeter nectar, than the misery riddled tears of Jets fans." ~ Finascious D
Frumundah FinnaticNew MemberSo did you get a nice buzz off the hemp fumes?
MonstBlitz;2232016 wrote:
It wouldn't surprise me if he is retained. Jeff Ireland is the nightmare that won't end. The **** stain you cannot flush. The Herpes for which there is no cure.
adamprez2003forum_veterando your amps go up to 11?
2019 DRAFT WISH LIST
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dolphindebbyluxury_boxSo glad your all ok pagan.
Now, don't scare us like this again.:no:
Can you post the pics here also?
I hope you played Smoke on the Water when you came back after your interlude.
Ray FinkleNew MemberObviously I'm glad everyone was ok but man those pictures are pretty cool! And I love the Penguin bass, it's sweet as hell.
Zeke0123forum_veteranwheeeeew I was worried you were going to say you lost a race to a civic :lol:...Glad everything is OK Pagan.
azfinfanmangluxury_box"adamprez2003 wrote:
do your amps go up to 11?
Pagan does NOT play with Spinaltap stooooopid ;pity:
-
Glad you're okay brother.
Another of lifes experiences.
mor911forum_veteranreminds me of an old tale http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Station_nightclub_fire
Glad everyone is ok
yesssssssssssssssssss
Fin D;2829671 wrote:
As mor wisely said
Paganforum_veteran"dolphindebby wrote:
So glad your all ok pagan.
Now, don't scare us like this again.:no:
Can you post the pics here also?
I'll post them when the photog sends them to me Deb. :)
do your amps go up to 11?
Nope...13. :wink2:
I hope you played Smoke on the Water when you came back after your interlude.
Read what I wrote bro, we were playing a song called "The Burning Times". No lie...
Obviously I'm glad everyone was ok but man those pictures are pretty cool! And I love the Penguin bass, it's sweet as hell.
Thanks man, there used to be a pic of me with it on the Pensblog. :D
wheeeeew I was worried you were going to say you lost a race to a civic :lol:...Glad everything is OK Pagan.
No, that wouldn't have been a tragedy....that would have been equal to the Hindenberg crash. :tongue2:
reminds me of an old tale http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Station_nightclub_fire
Glad everyone is ok
Mor...the scary irony in that was that we were booked to play that club. Thank the Goddess we weren't booked that NIGHT.
Here's another shot of the flashes going off:
Yikes.
".. hell you even have a fireman who rubs his balls on another mans head for three hours a week.. show some class, don't make fun of us poor Dolphins fans. :shifty:" ~ cnc66
"There is no sweeter nectar, than the misery riddled tears of Jets fans." ~ Finascious D
BigDogsHuntNew Memberto close for comfort........lesson learned!
BDH -
"To me, there are three things we all should do every day of our lives. Number one is laugh. You should laugh every day. Number two is think. You should spend some time in thought. And Number three is, you should have your emotions moved to tears, could be happiness or joy.
"If you laugh, you think, and you cry, that's a full day. That's a heck of a day. You do that seven days a week, you're going to have something special."
Jimmy V. (Mar '93)
charlestonphanNew Memberwow, glad it was not any worse than it was Pagan... that is wild.
R.I.P. Scott Knight; Dec. 1968 - Dec. 2007
Paganforum_veteranGot some shots from the show...in the midst of all the mess we got some GREAT pix! LOL!
The other singers you see are our old singer from the "Darkest Hour" album, who came up to sing two songs we did from that record, and a woman named Kelli McCloud who sings backup on one song off the new album and came up to sing the song live with us.
".. hell you even have a fireman who rubs his balls on another mans head for three hours a week.. show some class, don't make fun of us poor Dolphins fans. :shifty:" ~ cnc66
"There is no sweeter nectar, than the misery riddled tears of Jets fans." ~ Finascious D
anlgpNew Memberas alice in chains so succinctly put it "friends don't let friends give each other haircuts"
"A man's suffering is similar to the behavior of gas. If a certain quantity of gas is pumped into an empty chamber, it will fill the chamber completely and evenly, no matter how big the chamber. Thus, suffering completely fills the human soul and conscious mind, no matter whether the suffering great or little. Therefore, the "size" of human suffering is absolutely relative." - Viktor Frankl
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