Panic Spurs 6th Street Stampede During SXSW Amid Gun-Like Sounds

AUSTIN, TX — Reports of a human stampede along the 6th Street entertainment corridor surfaced early Saturday, although there have been no reports of injuries.

Social media posts suggest the stampede was prompted by some sort of prank along the corridor that's usually packed with revelers each weekend but even more congested during SXSW. According to those posts, the incident occurred at around 1:30 a.m.

Police had not released a statement related to the incident early Saturday.

Some people took to social media to alert loved ones they were safe and sound. "There were loud bangs, and everyone started screaming and running and stampeding and screaming to get down, so I dove on my stmach and knees behind a trash can and thought I was going to die," a woman wrote on social media. "Turns uot it was a prank. Not cool."

(The woman uses rough language in her post, so far warning for the easily offended.)

A pair of men posted photos of themselves on Twitter to alert family members and friends they were okay. “Just arrived at 6th Street in Austin,” one of them wrote. “A wave of people started running toward us ... so we started running away as well.”

The man posting the message asserted the stampede occurred after gunshots rang out, but police have yet to verify this was the case.

The mass panic comes in the wake of several recent mass shootings that claimed dozens of lives amid large gatherings. On Oct. 1, 2017, a gunman opened fire on a crowd of concertgoers in Las Vegas, killing 58 people and injuring another 851. The gunman fired more than 1,100 rounds from his suite atop the 32nd floor of a nearby hotel before being found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. More recently, 17 people were killed at a high school in Florida.

Closer to home, residents have been on edge following a series of explosive packages in Austin detonated at three separate homes in different parts of the city since March 2, killing two people and injuring two others.

>>> Photos above by Tony Cantú show scenes from 6th Street Friday evening mere hours prior to the early Saturday stampede