Pohoda Expects To Go To Court

Pohoda Festival organisers aren’t expecting an out-of-court settlement with the company that supplied the tent that collapsed at this year’s festival in Slovakia because the German firm appears to be ignoring their lawyer’s letters.

They decided to sue the supplier of the tent, which was lifted by the wind and collapsed on the crowd, because tests show the structure wasn’t as strong as tent supplier Bossert-Zelte had claimed. The tent collapse led to the death of a 19-year-old festivalgoer and put more than three dozen others in the hospital.

If it had been as sturdy as the German company claimed, researchers from the University of Zilina’s department of forensic engineering say it would have withstood the 18-metre-per-second winds that caused it to collapse.

Slovakian police launched an inquiry into the July 18 disaster, but Pohoda organizers also called in the university forensic experts to carry out their own study.

Festival chief Michal Kascak said his team hasn’t decided if next year’s Pohoda will go ahead and are unlikely to do so until the issue over the tent is settled.