Eye Cinema Evacuation...

Bass Cadet

Anyone else there tonight? In watching No country for Old Men when, half way through it and the movie stops, lights come on and some dude tells everyone to head to the exit. Get outside and there's cops, fire brigade and ambulance to bate the band, blue lights everywhere. About 300 people out in the pouring rain wondering what the hell is goin on.

Some cop said something about a 'gas leak' of some sort, then someone else said a guy was joyriding in the carpark underground. Security guy says it was probably a smoke bomb let off...bizarre! Anyway, didn't get to see the rest of the movie and was left to look on as cops and firemen walked around scratchin their arses! It was turnin out to be a great movie an all! Anyone else there?

JohnCleary

Did ya get a free pass to see another movie?

walt0r

I heard something about a petrol bomb or something. Somebody was threatening to use one...I'll ask my friend tomorrow he works there

cornbb

http://www.rte.ie/news/2008/0121/galway.html

Bejasus it made the dublin news lads *spits*

The use of a pepper spray canister is thought to have been the reason why a cinema in Galway city was evacuated last night.

Gardaí are investigating if the incident is related to the use of pepper spray in the Salthill area of the city a short time later after which a youth was arrested.

The manager became concerned when cinema-goers started to cough at around 10pm and the decision was taken to evacuate all 560 staff and patrons inside the cinema.
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Gardaí and the Galway Fire Brigade were called to the nine-screen complex in the Wellpark Retail Park.

Using breathing apparatus, fire officers conducted a search of the area but could not detect the source of the problem.

At around 11.15pm, gardaí were called to another incident in the Salthill area, this time concerning the use of a canister of pepper spray.

A youth was arrested and he is currently being held at Salthill Garda Station under Section 4 of the Criminal Justice Act.

Gardaí are carrying out follow-up searches and are investigating whether the two incidents are linked.

Doodee

sounds more exciting than the end of the film, half as confusing too!

Bass Cadet

Pepper spray? The little b@stard. I saw a paramedic checking out a lady alright who seemed a bit concerned.

John -No we didn't get a free pass to another movie. Bizarrely enough, no-one from the eye came out to even tell people what was going on or what we could do to get money back. The place is gone to shíte anyway. I don't know how they get away with the toilets being in such a manky state. I've seen better in 3rd world countries. Still have the ticket stub so i'd imagine there will be some sort of facility available

Best laugh of the night was the Garda van trying to reverse down the ramp into the underground carpark and hitting the height barrier -citizens of Galway are no doubt in safe hands

Sniipe

haha I missed the garda van going underground. I arrived at the cinema late for no country for old men and there was a few of us coughing and spluttering when we passed them new fangled moving stairs... anyway, the manager was looking around for the source of the dust/particles...
I kept the stub of the film so I'll be back there tonight and I'm coming in an hour late to catch the rest of the show. Bad form on the Eye cinema for not informing the crowd of anything.

Their popcorn sucks in there btw

galvianlord

listenin to keitho keitho keitho there. he read out a statement from eye, sayin if ya have your stubs ya can get a refund or another ticket for another show.

thank f@*k, was wonderin whether or not i'd get that €9.25 back....defo not goin back to I am Legend, was scared sh@*tless!

Sniipe

galvianlord wrote: »

defo not goin back to I am Legend, was scared sh@*tless!

LMAO!

I doubt it was 560 people. Probably a lot more. Closer to 700 probably. Seeing as how a few screens had sold out.

And as was said in the statement, hold on to your ticket stubs you can get your money back.

Bad form on the Eye cinema for not informing the crowd of anything.

Not that I can/am commenting officially, but don't think we knew what was going on

galvianlord

statement said somethin like 800

galvianlord

galvianlord wrote: »

statement said somethin like 800

Yeah that would be the closest figure I would imagine. Due to the fact that at least 3/4 screens had sold out.

Sniipe

Deleted User wrote: »

Not that I can/am commenting officially, but don't think we knew what was going on

Ah yeah thats fair enough, but there was loads waiting in the rain and cold. When evacuating that many people and it being the last show the staff could have informed us better... I could barely hear the guy who came into our show.

something like this could have been circulated:
"hold onto your stubs, we are evacuating the building due to a minor incident"

Then later on after the emergency services arrived they could have ushered us home and told us to come back another day and to hold onto the tickets.

I'm glad nothing serious happened and that the woman who was being looked after is ok.

Sniipe

Sniipe wrote: »

Ah yeah thats fair enough, but there was loads waiting in the rain and cold. When evacuating that many people and it being the last show the staff could have informed us better... I could barely hear the guy who came into our show.

something like this could have been circulated:
"hold onto your stubs, we are evacuating the building due to a minor incident"

Then later on after the emergency services arrived they could have ushered us home and told us to come back another day and to hold onto the tickets.

I'm glad nothing serious happened and that the woman who was being looked after is ok.

True. But we did manage to get that volume of people out in a short space of time.

We couldn't do much, mainly because I'm only finding out what was happening from here/my friends/the news. Our main concern was to get people out and away from the building, when that was finished we were all evacuated ourselves. So we were standing out in the rain and cold, too.

What film were ye watching, by the bye? Was it No Country For Old Men? I'm debating seeing that during the week.

Sniipe

ah yeah, it was a rapid mass exodus. We were on the road in 2 min of being told.
No country for old men was a good film, I'm hoping to catch the end of it... u think they will let me come in an hour after it starts don't want to watch the start again, I'll only be like "oh look out, this is going to happen next... BAMB... told u"

Sniipe

Sniipe wrote: »

ah yeah, it was a rapid mass exodus. We were on the road in 2 min of being told.
No country for old men was a good film, I'm hoping to catch the end of it... u think they will let me come in an hour after it starts don't want to watch the start again, I'll only be like "oh look out, this is going to happen next... BAMB... told u"

If you have your ticket stubs, you should be able to watch it again.

A cinema is a bad place for something like this to happen. I was leading people down through the fire escape and someone would say, "wait.. I've seen this film"

padi89

Sniipe wrote: »

I'm hoping to catch the end of it...

It might be best you dont.;)

Bass Cadet

padi89 wrote: »

It might be best you dont.;)

I've heard so much about this ending (or lack thereof perhaps?!), I need to be put out of my misery! Don't think I'll be heading back to the eye to see it anytime soon though, have too much on, it'll be a torrent from the interweb

galvianlord

http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=N1GnfuORXyE

Already up

Sniipe

http://www.rte.ie/news/2008/0121/galway_av.html?2327811,null,209

Steyr

Ya was there too in to see "No Country For Old Men" , really good film, ah well il just have to go see it again.

Mrs OBumble

Sniipe wrote: »

something like this could have been circulated:
"hold onto your stubs, we are evacuating the building due to a minor incident"

In a first-world country, the film would have stopped and a sign saying something like

"This is an emergency evacuation. Please leave by the nearest exit.

Please keep your tickets for re-entry or compensation purposes"

But here they just had some guy (I bet without even a megaphone) come in and yell and ya .. yeah, sounds like the Ireland we know and love

Mrs OBumble

Deleted User wrote: »

A cinema is a bad place for something like this to happen. I was leading people down through the fire escape and someone would say, "wait.. I've seen this film"

Yup, people are pretty stupid in situations like that. That's why the alarm bells in the corridors are usually so loud, to really get the punters moving along. Umm - you did turn on the alarms, didn't you?

(Nope ... why am I not surprised!)

_Whimsical_

JustMary wrote: »

Yup, people are pretty stupid in situations like that. That's why the alarm bells in the corridors are usually so loud, to really get the punters moving along. Umm - you did turn on the alarms, didn't you?

(Nope ... why am I not surprised!)

Goodness...where are you from? I thought that in Ireland bells ringing signify a drill or false alarm of sorts...nothing to be too worried about. In college lectures always continued uninterrupted despie ringing bells on the basis that if there really was a fire someone would surely come in and tell us.
We like our emergency warnings delivered in person here.

Bass Cadet

Its funny, I had a house-mate from California with us. He couldn't believe the relaxed response of everyone, laughing and joking outside. He reckons if that happened in the states, people would be freaking out and demanding to know what was happening or to get a refund. Welcome to Ireland bud

5times

It's just like the Tommy Teirnan sketch .

"Is that my phone?"

padraig71

Bit off topic I know, but can any of the Eye staff here tell me if/when the new film about Dylan, "I'm Not There", will be getting a run?

eulrin

I'm Not there is on limited release, meaning there's feck all prints of it in IRL/Uk so we have to wait our turn, i believe the end of february or beginning of march is the timeframe for it but its not confirmed yet.

littlems

as least some1 went in to ye, to tell ye to leave i was in screen 3 nd no1 came in to tel us there was an emergency da film was just turned off nd we left to see wat was happenin