The Hong Kong authorities will investigate why a large, heavy video screen fell from the ceiling during a concert by a popular boy band at a government-managed venue, injuring two dancers, officials said on Friday.
The accident happened during a performance on Thursday night by Mirror, a 12-member band in the Chinese territory whose popularity has grown during the coronavirus pandemic.
In footage from the concert at the Hong Kong Coliseum, audience members scream after the video screen lands directly on one dancer, apparently striking his neck. The South China Morning Post newspaper later reported that one of the two male dancers had suffered neck injuries and was in intensive care. It said the other was in stable condition.
The coliseum is 23 meters, or about 75 feet, high, according to the government agency that manages the venue. The screens for the four-sided projection system installed at the center of the venue, which hang from the ceiling by suspension wires, are each 5 meters by 3.9 meters.
The Hong Kong authorities said in a brief statement early Friday that the Leisure and Cultural Services Department, which manages the venue, had been asked to investigate the cause of the accident in coordination with officials from the Labor Department and other agencies.
The statement also said that the government had contacted the concert organizers on Wednesday — a day before the accident — about “stage incidents in the past few days.” It did not elaborate.
John Lee, Hong Kong’s chief executive, said in a separate statement that he had asked the leisure services department and the secretary for culture, sports and tourism to “review the safety requirements of similar performance activities.”
“I am shocked by the incident,” Mr. Lee said. “I express sympathy to those who were injured and hope that they would recover soon.”
On Tuesday, a member of Mirror, Frankie Chan Sui-fai, fell off the stage at the Hong Kong Coliseum during the second day of the band’s scheduled 12-day series of concerts, The South China Morning Post reported. He fell about a meter and was not seriously hurt, according to the report.
Makerville, the concert organizer, apologized for the accident in an Instagram post early Friday, adding that Mirror’s remaining concerts at the venue would be canceled.
The coliseum opened in 1983, when Hong Kong was still a British territory, and seats about 12,500 people, according to the Leisure and Cultural Services Department.
