Culture
'It was inhuman': Why the Copa America final was delayed and dangerously close to disaster
The black gates at the southwest entrance of Hard Rock Stadium had been closed for one hour and 45 minutes when a young child was hoisted on a guardian’s shoulders amid the crush of people waiting to get in for the Copa América final.
The boy waved his hands toward the police officers and security guards standing next to the lone door that was opening to let people into the stadium. He put his hands together as if in prayer, pleading with them to let him in.
“Please,” he said. “Please.”
As a security guard reached out and pulled the boy and his guardian toward the open gate, the boy started to cry in relief, then got spun around, the Messi No. 10 visible on the back of his sky blue and white Argentina jersey.
Similar scenes played out for more than two hours as fans pressed against the closed gates at the stadium in Miami Gardens, a near-disaster that overshadowed the spectacle of the game that was eventually played between Argentina and Colombia, two South American powers fighting for a major international trophy.
Supporters rush into Hard Rock Stadium ahead of Sunday’s Copa America final (Maddie Meyer/Getty Images)
Fans had been asked to arrive early, with watch parties banned outside the stadium or in the parking lots. Hard Rock also said “fans MUST have a game ticket” to enter the stadium campus on Sunday.
It was busy outside from 3 p.m., the gates opened at 5 p.m. and the crowd outside started to build around 6 p.m., about two hours from the scheduled kick-off. Several fans were arrested for hopping fences and trying to get into the game without tickets. The decision to shut the gates around the stadium — a response to what Miami-Dade Police called “unruly behavior” — would prove key to what followed.
— Miami-Dade Police (@MiamiDadePD) July 14, 2024
With the sun beating down, fans pushed toward the closed gates, causing a crush. There were few visible barriers to disperse the people trying to get in; to try to ease the flow. When the gates opened slightly, the fans swelled forward and security closed the gates again, with several people stuck outside saying they had no idea what was going on.
This pattern continued again and again, with fans being let in at a trickle, almost one by one. At times, kids would come through with their guardians, their faces beet red, soaked in sweat and many in tears. Other fans clearly suffering from heat-related issues were held upright by their friends. Miami-Dade Fire Rescue set up a medical station just inside the gates, where they treated a steady stream of people suffering from heat-related issues. Video showed fans holding their tickets up to cameras saying they paid $2,000 for seats, only to be denied entry.
A Hard Rock Stadium spokesperson said: “Throughout the afternoon and evening, there were numerous attempts by unruly fans without tickets to overpower security and law enforcement personnel at entry points to the stadium, putting themselves, other fans and security and stadium staff at extreme risk.
“Various stadium gates were closed and re-opened strategically in an attempt to allow ticketed guests to enter safely and in a controlled manner. Fans continued to engage in illegal conduct — fighting police officers, breaking down walls and barricades and vandalizing the stadium, causing significant damage to the property.”
Fans amassed outside Hard Rock Stadium’s south-eastern gate (Laura Williamson/The Athletic)
One woman, who identified herself later to The Athletic as Diana, was carried unconscious into the stadium by a police officer. She was laid down on the concrete in the area set up with medics and eventually woke up and was given water. Steven, a 34-year-old Colombian who lives in Miami and was with Diana, described the situation.
“Everyone started to push and you could feel yourself losing air,” he said. “And once we got closer to the gates, you can only imagine. I noticed that Diana was struggling. Fortunately, I was standing behind her.”
Diana, 28, said she remembered the moment she fainted.
“I tried to breathe,” she said. “A man kept telling me, ‘Try to breathe. Try to breathe’ and I responded that I wanted them to open another gate. They were using one gate for all of these people but people pushed back. I held on to a man that was standing near me. Everyone was pushing. Colombians, Argentines. Everyone was pushing.”
Even friends and family members of players were caught in the melee, as the southwest gate was an entry point for media and VIP ticket holders. The family of Colombia fullback Daniel Muñoz sat together just inside the entrance shortly after the gates were closed, having been pushed toward the entrance and eventually pulled inside.
“We were standing in line as a family waiting to get in and then the reckless people behind me started to push me,” said Manuela Ángel, Muñoz’s wife, who was bleeding from a cut on her wrist. “They thought I was causing chaos, so I was pushed towards the police officers, away from the line. They started yelling at my children. My oldest is six years old and my youngest isn’t even two yet. I’m here with Daniel’s grandmother, his mother, his aunt and other family members. I suffered the most because I was in front of all of them. I had the tickets.
“One police officer helped me because she saw me crying. I told her I was Daniel’s wife and that I was concerned for my children’s well-being. Entering other stadiums (during the tournament) has been fine but tonight was terrible. Just terrible.”
Argentina midfielder Alexis Mac Allister’s family was also caught up. “Alexis had to come out to get us in,” his mother, Silvina, said on Argentinian television. “He was worried about us. It was inhuman. He gave us a hug. We told him to stay calm and get ready to play.”
A fan is detained by police at Hard Rock Stadium (Juan Mabromata/AFP via Getty Images)
One media member, who works for a rights-holder for the tournament, was slammed to the ground and arrested after getting through a gate where media members had been held.
Argentina and Colombia players went out to warm up in front of a sparse crowd at just after 7 p.m., only to abort their routines by 7.30 p.m. when it became obvious the match could not start on time.
“When we were warming up and in the locker rooms, they told us there was a half-hour delay,” said Colombia head coach Nestor Lorenzo. “It was more, right? We were trying to talk to our family members and friends and finding out if they were OK. It was a bit weird and chaotic. We tried to keep calm but there was a level of anxiousness.”
Two fans, both wearing Honduras gear, got in around 8 p.m., after two hours of waiting in the mass of people. Both were soaked in sweat and visibly frustrated. They said police threatened them with tear gas and tasers.
“What’s happening is they want to control the people in the front and it’s not the people in the front. They’re pushing from the back,” Alejandro Flores told The Athletic. “You have to move the people in front out and control the people in the back. Pull them back so that the people can be orderly.
“Their job is to protect and serve. The people are fainting in front of their faces and it doesn’t matter to them at all. They don’t even want to give us water. Not even water, man. Not even water.”
Flores’ frustration boiled over again as he looked back at the people still pressed against the fences behind him.
“CONMEBOL is a disaster,” he said of the tournament’s organizers, the South American Football Confederation. “In North Carolina (the Uruguay-Colombia semifinal) was a test. They should have prepared themselves and the same thing is happening. North Carolina was a disaster. Right now, it’s going down the same path, or worse.
“CONMEBOL should not have brought this tournament to the United States… Look around, because they’re not ready for a World Cup.”
Fans wait to be granted entry into the stadium (Megan Briggs/Getty Images)
This stadium will host seven matches at the 2026 men’s World Cup — four in the group stage, a round-of-32 game, a quarterfinal and the third-place playoff. The tournament is organized by soccer’s world governing body FIFA as opposed to CONMEBOL.
Another fan who declined to give a name stood with his hands on his hips near an escalator at the entrance, watching the scene from which he had just emerged continue to play out.
“People piled on. There was more and more pressure and people were fainting,” he said. “There are children vomiting, a lot of people there, and you can’t move. In other words, you don’t have control of your body; you go where they push you. And on top of that, there is no one to organize or help with anything.”
As he was talking, police officers backed away from the gates and stood off to the side. Suddenly, at around 8:15 p.m., a quarter-hour after the game was initially supposed to kick off, the southwest gates were opened and fans flooded in without tickets being checked or anyone being patted down or passing through metal detectors.
A Hard Rock Stadium spokesperson said: “Shortly after 8 p.m., stadium officials, CONMEBOL, CONCACAF and law enforcement officers communicated and decided to open stadium gates for a short period of time to all fans to prevent stampedes and serious injury at the perimeter. The gates were then closed once the threat of fans being crushed was alleviated. At that time, the venue was at capacity and gates were not re-opened.”
Video taken from the stadium appeared to show fans still sneaking into the stadium after that initial rush of supporters were let in. One video showed fans crawling through an opening up near a ceiling adjacent to ventilation. Another video showed fans climbing a makeshift ladder to get over a fence.
Thousands were still outside when the game eventually kicked off at 9.22 p.m., 82 minutes after it should have started. Some watched from the stadium’s aisles until police combed through the crowd checking for tickets and asking those without them to leave. Others retreated to the stadium concourses for food and water — alcohol sales were suspended shortly after kick off.
Those refused entry remained until well into the second half of the game, past 11pm, and Argentina did not seal its win until gone midnight after extra time.
Supporters eventually got to watch Argentina’s 1-0 win over Colombia — but those who gained entry without tickets were removed (Megan Briggs/Getty Images)
Miami-Dade mayor Daniella Levine Cava issued a statement along with chief public safety officer James Reyes saying Miami-Dade Police provided more than 550 officers for the game and that they were “outraged by the unprecedented events at tonight’s Copa America finals”.
“The Copa America final is organized by CONMEBOL and Miami-Dade Police Department provides security support, along with other law enforcement agencies,” the statement read.
“Let’s be clear: This situation should never have taken place and cannot happen again. We will work with stadium leadership to ensure that a full review of tonight’s events takes place immediately to evaluate the full chain of events, in order to put in place needed protocols and policies for all future games.”
Hard Rock Stadium promised to work with CONMEBOL to address the “individual concerns of ticket holders who could not get in”.
“We are grateful to the law enforcement officers who managed a difficult situation and prioritized the safety of the venue, the players, their families and the fans,” a spokesperson added. “We will continue to work with law enforcement to identify and hold criminals accountable who engaged in illegal conduct tonight.
“It is disappointing that a night of celebration was impacted by unlawful and unsafe behavior and we will fully review the processes and protocols in place tonight and work with law enforcement to ensure such an event never happens again.”
Members of the press were caught out, too: Veronica Brunati, one of Argentina’s most respected football reporters, tweeted at 10.37pm to say she had been unable to enter the stadium.
“This is a nightmare,” she wrote. “It’s madness. There are thousands of us here outside our entrance gate.
“But I’m alive, thank God.”
(Top photos: Maddie Meyer, Megan Briggs/Getty Images; design: Dan Goldfarb)
Whatever you do, don’t think of a bird.
Now: What kind of bird are you not thinking about? A pigeon? A bald eagle? Something more poetic, like a skylark or a nightingale? In any case, would you say that this bird you aren’t thinking about is real?
Before you answer, read this poem, which is quite literally about not thinking of a bird.
Human consciousness is full of riddles. Neuroscientists, philosophers and dorm-room stoners argue continually about what it is and whether it even exists. For Wallace Stevens, the experience of having a mind was a perpetual source of wonder, puzzlement and delight — perfectly ordinary and utterly transcendent at the same time. He explored the mysteries and pleasures of consciousness in countless poems over the course of his long poetic career. It was arguably his great theme.
Stevens was born in 1879 and published his first book, “Harmonium,” in 1923, making him something of a late bloomer among American modernists. For much of his adult life, he worked as an executive for the Hartford Accident and Indemnity Company, rising to the rank of vice president. He viewed insurance less as a day job to support his poetry than as a parallel vocation. He pursued both activities with quiet diligence, spending his days at the office and composing poems in his head as he walked to and from work.
As a young man, Stevens dreamed of traveling to Europe, though he never crossed the Atlantic. In middle age he made regular trips to Florida, and his poems are frequently infused with ideas of Paris and Rome and memories of Key West. Others partake of the stringent beauty of New England. But the landscapes he explores, wintry or tropical, provincial or cosmopolitan, are above all mental landscapes, created by and in the imagination.
Are those worlds real?
Let’s return to the palm tree and its avian inhabitant, in that tranquil Key West sunset of the mind.
Until then, we find consolation in fangles.
When the director Rob Reiner cast his leads in the 1986 film “Stand by Me,” he looked for young actors who were as close as possible to the personalities of the four children they’d be playing. There was the wise beyond his years kid from a rough family (River Phoenix), the slightly dim worrywart (Jerry O’Connell), the cutup with a temper (Corey Feldman) and the sensitive, bookish boy.
Wil Wheaton was perfect for that last one, Gordie Lachance, a doe-eyed child who is ignored by his family in favor of his late older brother. Now, 40 years later, he’s traveling the country to attend anniversary screenings of the film, alongside O’Connell and Feldman, which has thrown him back into the turmoil that he felt as an adolescent.
Wheaton has channeled those emotions and his on-set memories into his latest project: narrating a new audiobook version of “The Body,” the 1982 Stephen King novella on which the film was based.
A few years ago, Wheaton started to float the idea of returning to the story that gave him his big break — that of a quartet of boys in 1959 Oregon, in their last days before high school, setting out to find a classmate’s dead body. “I’ve been telling the story of ‘Stand By Me’ since I was 12 years old,” he said.
But this time was different. Wheaton, who has narrated dozens of audiobooks, including Andy Weir’s “The Martian” and Ernest Cline’s “Ready Player One,” says he has come to enjoy narration more than screen acting. “I’m safe, I’m in the booth, nobody’s looking at me and I can just tell you a story.”
The fact that he, an older man looking back on his younger years, is narrating a story about an older man looking back on his younger years, is not lost on Wheaton. King’s original story is bathed in nostalgia. Coming to terms with death and loss is one of its primary themes.
Two days after appearing on stage at the Academy Awards as part of a tribute to Reiner — who was murdered in 2025 alongside his wife, Michele — Wheaton got on the phone to talk about recording the audiobook, reliving his favorite scenes from the film and reexamining a quintessential story of childhood loss through the lens of his own.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
“I felt really close to him, and my memory of him.”
Wheaton on channeling a co-star’s performance.
There’s this wonderful scene in “Stand By Me.” Gordie and Chris are walking down the tracks talking about junior high. Chris is telling Gordie, “I wish to hell I was your dad, because I care about you, and he obviously doesn’t.”
It’s just so honest and direct, in a way that kids talk to each other that adults don’t. And I think that one of the reasons that really sticks with people, and that piece really lands on a lot of audiences, and has for 40 years, is, just too many people have been Gordie in that scene.
That scene is virtually word for word taken from the text of the book. And when I was narrating that, I made a deliberate choice to do my best to recreate what River did in that scene.
“You’re just a kid,
Gordie–”
“I wish to fuck
I was your father!”
he said angrily.
“You wouldn’t go around
talking about takin those stupid shop courses if I was!
It’s like
God gave you something,
all those stories
you can make up, and He said:
This is what we got for you, kid.
Try not to lose it.
But kids lose everything
unless somebody looks out for them and if your folks
are too fucked up to do it
then maybe I ought to.”
I watched that scene a couple of times because I really wanted — I don’t know why it was so important to me to — well, I know: because I loved him, and I miss him. And I wanted to bring him into this as best as I could, right?
So I was reading that scene, and the words are identical to the script. And I had this very powerful flashback to being on the train tracks that day in Cottage Grove, Oregon. And I could see River standing next to them. They’re shooting my side of the scene and there’s River, right next to the camera, doing his off-camera dialogue, and there’s the sound guy, and there’s the boom operator. There’s my key light.
I could hear and feel it. It was the weirdest thing. It’s like I was right back there.
I was able to really take in the emotional memory of being Gordie in all of those scenes. So when I was narrating him and I’m me and I’m old with all of this experience, I just drew on what I remembered from being that little boy and what I remember of those friendships and what they meant to me and what they mean to me today.
“Rob gave me a gift. Rob gave me a career.”
Wheaton recalls the “Stand By Me” director’s way with kids on set, as well as his recent Oscars tribute.
Rob really encouraged us to be kids.
Jerry tells the most amazing story about that scene, where we were all sitting around, and doing our bit, and he improvised. He was just goofing around — we were just playing — and he said something about spitting water at the fat kid.
We get to the end of the scene, and he hears Rob. Rob comes around from behind the thing, and he goes, “Jerry!” And Jerry thinks, “Oh no, I’m in trouble. I’m in trouble because I improvised, and I’m not supposed to improvise.”
The context for Jerry is that he had been told by the adults in his life, “Sit on your hands and shut up. Stop trying to be a cutup. Stop trying to be funny. Stop disrupting people. Just be quiet.” And Jerry thinks, “Oh my God. I didn’t shut up. I’m in trouble. I’m gonna get fired.”
Rob leans in to all of us, and Rob says, “Hey, guys, do you see that? More of that. Do that!”
The whole time when you’re a kid actor, you’re just around all these adults who are constantly telling you to grow up. They’re mad that you’re being a kid. Rob just created an environment where not only was it supported that we would be kids — and have fun, and follow those kid instincts and do what was natural — it was expected. It was encouraged. We were supposed to do it.
They chanted together:
“I don’t shut up,
I grow up.
And when I look at you I throw up.”
“Then your mother goes around the corner
and licks it up,”
I said, and hauled ass out of there,
giving them the finger over my shoulder as I went.
I never had any friends later on
like the ones I had when I was twelve.
Jesus, did you?
When we were at the Oscars, I looked at Jerry. And we looked at this remarkable assemblage of the most amazingly talented, beautiful artists and storytellers. We looked around, and Jerry leans down, and he said, “We all got our start with Rob Reiner. He trusted every single one of us.”
And to stand there for him, when I really thought that I would be standing with him to talk about this stuff — it was a lot.
“I was really really really excited — like jumping up and down.”
The scene Wheaton was most looking forward to narrating: the tale of Lard Ass Hogan.
I was so excited to narrate it. It’s a great story! It’s a funny story. It’s such a lovely break — it’s an emotional and tonal shift from what’s happening in the movie.
I know this as a writer: You work to increase and release tension throughout a narrative, and Stephen King uses humor really effectively to release that tension. But it also raises the stakes, because we have these moments of joy and these moments of things being very silly in the midst of a lot of intensity.
That’s why the story of Lard Ass Hogan is so fun for me to tell. Because in the middle of that, we stop to do something that’s very, very fun, and very silly and very celebratory.
“Will you shut up and let him tell it?”
Teddy hollered.
Vern blinked.
“Sure. Yeah.
Okay.”
“Go on, Gordie,”
Chris said. “It’s not really much—”
“Naw,
we don’t expect much from a wet end like you,”
Teddy said,
“but tell it anyway.”
I cleared my throat. “So anyway.
It’s Pioneer Days,
and on the last night
they have these three big events.
There’s an egg-roll for the little kids and a sack-race for kids that are like eight or nine,
and then there’s the pie-eating contest.
And the main guy of the story
is this fat kid nobody likes
named Davie Hogan.”
When I narrate this story — whenever there is a moment of levity or humor, whenever there are those brief little moments that are the seasoning of the meal that makes it all so real and relatable — yes, it was very important to me to capture those moments.
I’m shifting in my chair, so I can feel each of those characters. It’s something that doesn’t exist in live action. It doesn’t exist in any other media.
“I feel the loss.”
Wheaton remembers River Phoenix.
The novella “The Body” is very much about Gordie remembering Chris. It’s darker, and it’s more painful, than the movie is.
I’ve been watching the movie on this tour and seeing River a lot. I remember him as a 14- and 15-year-old kid who just seemed so much older, and so much more experienced and so much wiser than me, and I’m only a year younger than him.
What hurts me now, and what I really felt when I was narrating this, is knowing what River was going through then. We didn’t know. I still don’t know the extent of how he was mistreated, but I know that he was. I know that adults failed him. That he should have been protected in every way that matters. And he just wasn’t.
And I, like Gordie, remember a boy who was loving. So loving, and generous and cared deeply about everyone around him, all the time. Who deserved to live a full life. Who had so much to offer the world. And it’s so unfair that he’s gone and taken from us. I had to go through a decades-long grieving process to come to terms with him dying.
Near the end
of 1971,
Chris
went into a Chicken Delight in Portland
to get a three-piece Snack Bucket.
Just ahead of him,
two men started arguing
about which one had been first in line. One of them pulled a knife.
Chris,
who had always been the best of us
at making peace,
stepped between them and was stabbed in the throat.
The man with the knife had spent time in four different institutions;
he had been released from Shawshank State Prison
only the week before.
Chris died almost instantly.
It is a privilege that I was allowed to tell this story. I get to tell Gordie Lachance’s story as originally imagined by Stephen King, with all of the experience of having lived my whole adult life with the memory of spending three months in Gordie Lachance’s skin.
Welcome to Great Adaptations, the Book Review’s regular multiple-choice quiz about printed works that have gone on to find new life as movies, television shows, theatrical productions and more. This week’s challenge highlights offbeat television shows that began as comic books. Just tap or click your answers to the five questions below. And scroll down after you finish the last question for links to the comics and their screen versions.
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