What in the world could cause nearly 300 children and some adults to collapse in one area. Pesticides, Mass Hysteria, Sickness?
In July of 1980, Nottinghamshire, England. A large group of children attending a music competition suddenly collapsed for a reason still baffling scientists today.
A total of around 500 children were entered into the bands competition. The event, to raise charity for school bands, began at 9am, by 10:30am, Children began to collapse all around the field. One of the organizers for the Event stated.
"We were preparing for the stage display, when one or two kids dropped to the floor. Then a few more, and then a few more. Then spectators started collapsing."
All of the children spoke of the same symptoms. Fainting (obviously), headache, stomach pains, some event stated they had a metallic taste in their mouth. Reports from children around the area all stated basically the same thing. They stated they felt weak and could not walk, they saw their friends collapsing and then they collapsed.
Given the fact that most of the children reported the same symptoms a sickness was the first thought. Around 260 of the children ended up being taken to local hospitals with only a few of them being held overnight.
The children were from many different schools, so this to me ALMOST rules out food poisoning or something along those lines. The reports also state that obviously the kids were tired from their journeys, and nervous. It is thought that this could be the culprit.
One or two of the kids faint due to these stressers, others are overcome by this, some adults see it and lose it, therefore they faint, and so on.
A main idea that surfaced many years later was that it could have been pesticides used in the area. Some of which like, tridemorph, became illegal in the late 90's. However, in the 80's would have indeed been used in the area. This, even though it was put forth 20 years after the incident, is expected to be a leading cause.
While I do not agree with food poisoning to a degree. If the kids all got there around the same time. I am sure there were refreshments set up. Drink areas and that sort of thing. I think it could be possible that something could have happened there to lead to this. Either spiked, or possibly local fruit used in juices??? I have no idea, but just a thought.
To revisit one idea, Mass Hysteria. As Stated above, there could be something to this. As I have covered in multiple forms before, the dancing plague of 1518 is one of these incidents.
People begin dancing in the streets, day and night. Others start to join and some even dance until they die. Now, this is thought to have possibly happened because of a wheat mold, but is still used as a possible example of Mass hysteria.
While there are multiple possibilities, I would lean towards a very localized food poisoning, more than likely by drink. That or Mass Hysteria. In this incident I think this could be viable. Random kids start getting sick and dropping. their friends who are also nervous and tried drop. Then some parents are overcome by the incident, boom they drop. The official cause has never truly been uncovered, unless something like this happens again, we may never know what truly caused over 300 people to faint that day.