VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) – Organizers of the PNE insist the stages at the Fair won’t see a repeat of mishaps in Ottawa and Indiana. Over the weekend bad weather and stage design came together in the tragedy in which five people died at the Indiana State Fair.
Last month, classic rockers Cheap Trick were lucky to escape unhurt when a stage collapsed in Ottawa.
“The stage at the PNE is very different. It is a singular unit stage where the roof and the stage structure are a single unit,” says Laura Ballance with the PNE.
She means the rigging problem seen in Indiana won’t be an issue here.
The stages at the Fair are being built by the same company linked to the Ottawa collapse, but Ballance says all of them are approved by an engineer at the design stage and then inspected on site.
The PNE runs from August 20th – September 5th.