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Fyre Festival is probably a phrase that stirs deep in people’s memory. Last year, the disastrous music festival to promote a celebrity booking app turned into one of the most horrifying events in music and entertainment history. Billy McFarland was the sole mastermind behind this scam that stranded thousands of kids in the Bahama’s and left millions of dollars of uncollected paychecks in his wake. But, just how did he pull it off? And how did nobody notice this disaster happening as it was unfolding? Apparently, the allure of a $100 thousand dollar-a-ticket music festival was just too good for some people to pass up.
Coolest Festival Ever?
Fyre Festival was supposed to be one of the coolest, most exciting festivals ever. Social media influencers and A-List celebrities were flocking to get tickets and luxury VIP suits for the event. Â This event seemed too good to be true with legendary bands performing in the Bahamas, a private and all-exclusive beach fitted with private villas… Unfortunately, festival-goers learned that it truly was too good to be true…
The Scammers
The two heads of operation were rapper and producer Ja Rule and tech-entrepreneur Billy McFarland. According to Ja Rule’s testimony, McFarland approached his team in 2015 with the idea and apparent schematics in terms of money, venue, budget, and amenities.
The Idea
They end up becoming co-founders of Fyre, which is an app that is for booking celebrity appearances and will host the super fabulous festival just to promote it. This should have been the first red flag for everyone involved. A brand new app dedicated to using celebrities for personal gain? It was doomed to fail. Instead of letting it fail on its own, they took down thousands of people with them. It went even beyond that…
Insane Costs To Rich Kids
Festival-goers easily caught wind of this lavish experience. It was marketed to the rich millennial. They would be given two weekends on the private island that was advertised as “once owned by Pablo Escobar” in the Bahamas’ Exumas district. Tickets were listed from a few thousand to $250,000 per person. This was the rich kids’ dream, and many people thought it to be too over-the-top for most.Â
The Undelivered Promises and a Treasure Hunt?
For the festival, Fyre claimed to have artists Blink-182, Migos, and Major Lazer appearing. They Included in the almost horrifyingly expensive tickets were elegant villa’s for housing, gourmet catering by Steven Starr, beach yoga all day and tons of models that were ready to party with you. They were also promised a treasure hunt where $1 million in jewelry, watches, and cash could be found. The winner could also win an oceanfront property in the Exumas district. And somehow, no one thought this was crazy.
The Notorious Photo Shoot
One of the most well-known factors of this disaster was the number of models and influencers they hired to promote this faux-festival. In December of 2016, they began their campaign and filled people’s social media feeds with all of these false promises of the most luxurious festival only for the richest kids. Kendall Jenner is among the famous models to promote this false festival. She was paid $250,000 to advertise the event. The idea of famous models and musicians, along with private villas and a beach was all these kids ever needed. Some spent their entire savings just go to on this trip…
Things Begin To Crash and Burn Already
Two months before the event was supposed to take place, organizers began to try and organize the necessities… This should have been one of the first things done, and yet, they scrambled last minute. Things began to fall through. Fyre already didn’t have enough money to order the trailers for bathrooms and showers. McFarland got a high-interest loan of $5 million, but soon they would realize most of that money wouldn’t be seen…
High-Profile Artists Begin To Experience Issues
The Wall Street Journal obtains information as trouble begins to brew for the highly publicized event. Some Fyre performers did not receive their money on time. Ticket holders were experiencing issues about their travel arrangements and were met with radio silence from organizers. Again, more red flags that were seemingly ignored. Some people just loved the idea of the rich-kid festival so much they ignored these telltale signs…
More Truth Comes To Light
With these financial issues arising, many journalists took it upon themselves to investigate. As it turns out, the video of the “festival grounds” was actually just a really good CGI rendering. The private island is just the main island of Grand Exuma. It was an underdeveloped part of the Bahamas that was not ready for thousands of people. Also, Pablo Escobar never even owned an island in the Bahamas, so that was a straight out lie. Finally, Major Lazer was booked at the Middlelands Festival in Texas when they were supposed to be booked at Fyre Festival. Still, people clambered to get to the festival…
Things Hit The Fan
The night before the Fyre Festival weekend, Blink-182 pulled out. They stated that they were “not confident we would have what we need” to perform the show. Organizers were still silent on the matter. Many festival goers were uninformed of the disaster that was already happening and made their way to the grounds. Once they got there, it was total chaos…
Fans Get To The Bahamas
A chartered plane from Miami began bringing the festival goers. Once they got to the grounds, it looked like a literal war zone. The villas were disaster relief tens. The gourmet catering was pieces of bread, cheese, and some leafy greens. The staff was confused about what was happening. No one knew where to go, but they figured this is not where they were supposed to be. The pictures they advertised looked nothing like this…
The Government Gets Involved
Chaos quickly erupts. Social media posts go wild and authorities are called to handle the huge grounds. The Bahamian officials canceled all inbound flights, and many travelers try to get a flight back out. The Exumas airport is overwhelmed, packed, and heated.
Hours and Hours Go By
Overnight, people are frenzied. They’re hungry, scared, angry, and confused. Fyre Festival organizers were completely silent until the early hours of the morning. All they say is that the festival is postponed and that attendees should go home. They offer no other advice, options, or help. Festival attendees are completely stranded, with no word on what’s happening or how they can get home. Almost all hope is lost…
Ja Rule Offers a Statement
In the midst of it all, Ja Rule is quick to pass the blame onto someone else. He writes that the festival “was NOT A SCAM” and that “this is NOT MY FAULT.” He completely disaffiliated online and deletes any posts regarding the festival.
Bahamian Officials
In the midst of it all, the ministry of tourism announced that they were disowning Fyre Festival. They cited the “total disorganization and chaos” that went down as none of the advice they gave the festival organizers were heeded. They cited that “The event organizers assured us that all measures were taken to ensure a safe and successful event but clearly they did not have the capacity to execute an event of this scale.” Â
Leaked Information Spreads Like Wildfire
Many reports were leaked from Fyre staff that never made it to the islands. Apparently, organizers told employees and talent to not leave Miami because the festival site wasn’t ready due to financial issues. They never made a statement to the attendees. Because of that drastic mistake, things were completely blowing up and out of control.
McFarland Finally Speaks
Apparently, bad weather was to blame for the complete chaos that ensued. McFarland went far and wide to avoid getting any of the blame. He even claimed they will try again in 2018 at a U.S. beach instead. He promises everyone full refunds, and everyone who bought 2017 tickets can go for free in 2018… Were people foolish enough to believe him again?
Lawsuits Come Pouring In
A whopping $100 million class-action lawsuit was filed by Mark Geragos on behalf of attendees. They gathered evidence claiming that Fyre’s organizers flew the guests into the Exumas even though they knew the grounds were beyond not ready and not able to handle that many people. Organizers also ended up screwing attendees by having them upload money to festival wristbands for a “cashless” event, meaning that they didn’t even have the cash to hail a cab. Attendees were completely stranded. Some even suffered scary medical events with no help to be found…
Medical Emergency Handled Horribly Wrong
Many of the staff turned to lock guests in nearby buildings to attempt to control the crowd. One attendee suffered a medical emergency and ended up losing consciousness after being ignored by staff.
Scam Comes To Light
Despite what Ja Rule said, more lawsuits were filed with evidence of this festival being a huge scam. National Event Services was contracted by Fyre to provide medical services. The organizers failed to buy cancellation insurance to a medical service and failed to secure a medical evacuation helicopter in case of emergencies, such as this. Also, the medical clinic that they were supposed to set up was uninhabitable and infested with bugs, bloodied mattresses, and no air conditioning.
McFarland Goes To Jail
In March 2018, almost a year after the debacle, Billy McFarland plead guilty to two counts of wire fraud for the Fyre Festival disaster. He scammed investors, ticket vendors, and their contracted services in an attempt to pocket $26 million for himself. Manhattan US Attorney Geoffrey Berman called his actions a “disturbing pattern of deception.” What he did was unthinkable…
McFarlands Actions
McFarland admitted to lying to US officials about how many people were coming, what amenities he was using, and how much money he was spending on the event. He took shortcuts, didn’t pay services, and defrauded thousands of ticket buyers for a phony event. He was also found guilty of constantly lying to investors before, during, and even after the event took place. He lied about money, people he was hiring, and expenses put toward the comfort of guests.
Long Lasting Effects On Everyone Involved
McFarland will be in jail and has shame all over his name, but his guests will forever pay the price of trying to have a nice weekend away. Joe Nemeth, one of the investors he scammed said McFarland had “financially ruined my and my wife’s life. It took me 20 years of saving my lunch money to save $180,000,” he said. They will not be able to retire due to the loss of money. “I hope the justice system has the last laugh at Mr. McFarland.”
First-Hand Experience On The Inside
A woman who worked for the event before its demise had a very interesting encounter…
“On Wednesday, Ja Rule arrived for a “site visit.” I don’t know if he actually visited the “site” but he did spend a lot of time on a yacht, according to his Instagram. Meanwhile,e the event planners were holed up indoors putting together a game plan and a budget. With so little having been prepared ahead of time, the official verdict was that it would take $50 million to pull off. Planners also warned that it would not be up to the standard they had advertised. The best idea, they said, would be to roll everyone’s tickets over to 2018 and start planning for the next year immediately. They had a meeting with the Fyre execs to deliver the news. A guy from the marketing team said, “Let’s just do it and be legends, man.”
Listen To Your Gut
An anonymous person wrote in about their experience at the airport in Miami… It wasn’t good: “The airline didn’t scan our boarding passes or anything. They just collected our boarding passes and did a count, which was the first time I’ve flown anywhere recently where they didn’t scan. We were on the plane and decided to get off because we kept getting texts and phone calls from our friends on the island and they’re like, don’t come, don’t come. We had other friends who were like, okay we see tents, but it’s super disorganized. We were getting texts and in the pictures, [the Fyre organizers] were still fencing up around the water [on the beach]. Every single picture that they advertised felt like one of those schemes. We’ve been to the Bahamas before, we know what it looks like, and this was totally different.”
Experience On The Island
Brett Linkletter talked with People Magazine about his experience. He was a part of the unlucky bunch that made it to the island. “There was a makeshift concierge tent where someone was supposed to show you to your room, but no one was there. We went to our “beach lodges/cabanas” that turned out to be sketchy little tents held up by pipes. You were supposed to be assigned a room when you got there, but obviously, no one got assigned a room and there were people fighting for tents because there weren’t enough places to sleep.”
Total Chaos
Linkletter continued. “People just started running after tents trying to lock down a location to sleep; everyone was searching, but everything was taken and it was just insane. Most of the rooms didn’t even have beds with sheets on them or pillows. Someone even lit their tent on fire because they were so pissed. From a girl’s perspective, it’s kind of sketchy because the tents don’t lock up, they’ve very janky, everyone’s drunk – it’s just not a safe environment at all.”
Lesson Learned
Hopefully, anyone who thinks that deciding to scam thousands of people of millions of dollars will think again. The attendees were stranded by themselves with barely any food and water along with absolutely no shelter. McFarland got caught and will be now spending the next few years in jail while investors and artists that trusted him are out thousands of dollars.