Witnesses told AyiboPost how the tragic events of that Saturday unfolded. The State seemed to be the only institution unaware of the wave of young people preparing to celebrate at Haiti’s most iconic monument—an event loudly promoted through car loudspeakers and widely shared online
When the 24-year-old young artist arrives at the entrance of the Sans-Souci Palace on April 11 around eleven in the morning, to take part in an activity at Citadelle Laferrière, a dense crowd has already gathered there: scuffles break out, some people fall into drainage canals, while others are trampled underfoot.
No one yet imagines that a disaster of an entirely different magnitude will unfold a few hours later, claiming the lives of 25 people who had come to visit the Citadelle and participate in an activity not authorized by the municipality of Milot.
Six sources, three of whom were present on the scene, describe to AyiboPost a day marked by exceptional crowd numbers, a catastrophic failure of organization, and crowd movements that rapidly spiraled into scenes of mass panic.
Every Holy Thursday, starting at midnight, Citadelle Laferrière experiences a peak in visitor attendance. The following days still draw visitors, but in considerably smaller numbers, according to the authorities.
This year, however, the bulk of the crowd shifted to the following Saturday — a day that is normally much quieter. This massive turnout « was unforeseen, » states the mayor of Milot, Joseph Wesner, to AyiboPost.
The mayor, along with the Civil Protection officer Jean Henri Petit, attribute this unusual presence to the promotion of an activity that had not been approved by the municipality, organized within the grounds of Haiti’s most emblematic historical monument.
According to the mayor’s office, the first visitors arrived around 4:30 in the morning.
When asked what measures he took upon realizing the scale of the situation, the mayor — whose administration has been in office for approximately fifteen days — claims to have taken « arrangements. » After being pressed for specifics on those measures, the call was cut off. Since then, the official has remained unreachable by phone.
Reached by AyiboPost, the director of the Institute for the Safeguarding of National Heritage (ISPAN), Patrick Delatour, explains that only the Ministry of Communication is authorized to speak officially on the matter.
« I am on my way to the Citadelle to participate in the investigation. We will communicate the necessary details at the appropriate time, » says the director, who is also a former Minister of Culture and Communication, to AyiboPost.
At two in the afternoon, the 24-year-old young artist from Acul-du-Nord arrives at the Citadelle’s parking area with about forty people in his group, before mounting a horse that will carry him up to the site, perched at 900 meters above sea level.
Along the road, the atmosphere builds: a large crowd advances to the rhythm of rara bands.
But once on site, the situation deteriorates.
Many people were already packed inside the Citadelle. According to the artist, individuals tasked with regulating entry « blocked the door. »
The young artist manages to get inside.
Inside, he witnesses visitors beginning to scale the walls of the monument using a defective ladder. « The cabled guardrails that topped the walls had rotted cables, » the young artist observes.
Despite these conditions, the crowd continues to pour into the Citadelle.
As the rain intensifies, surfaces become slippery and fog envelops the entire site.
« There was a commotion. I heard people screaming for help, while others were shouting that people had fallen off the cliffs, » he recounts.
Around three o’clock, as he tries to leave the premises, he finds himself caught in a contradictory flow of movement: « People were leaving the Citadelle while others were still coming in. It seemed like more people were entering than were going out. »
The imbalance triggers a violent crowd surge.
« I saw asthmatic people who could not reach their inhalers, others who went into cardiac arrest, people who fractured bones from falling, or who died from asphyxiation, » according to the witness.
After a partial clearing of the main access point, the young man manages to extract himself from the crush. « I saw dead people along the way, » he tells AyiboPost.
Photographer Marc-Henry Antoine had accompanied the administrators of a vocational school from Gonaïves on a visit to the Citadelle that same day. He reports having observed an immense crowd and a program animated by a DJ upon arriving at the site in the afternoon.
Antoine describes a situation that was completely abnormal compared to other days at the Citadelle: there was no longer any space for cars in the parking lot.
« We reached the main entrance gate of the Citadelle with great difficulty, there were so many people. We were unable to complete the visit and left the premises around fifteen hundred hours, » he explains.
There was a strong presence of minors at the Citadelle, according to Herns Pierre, CEO of a vocational school in Milot. Several schools had organized field trips to the site on that very day, the administrator adds.
Two witnesses who were on the scene at the time of the tragedy, contacted by AyiboPost, raise the possibility of tear gas having been used to disperse a fight within the crowd.
Harold Jean, spokesperson for the Haitian National Police for the Northern Department, confirms to AyiboPost the detention of seven individuals in connection with the investigation into the tragedy.
Among those detained are municipal police officers from Milot, security officers from the Citadelle, and an ISPAN official responsible for authorizing access to the site.
He specifies that the National Police had not been informed of any activities taking place on the premises.
Regarding the testimonies reporting the use of tear gas inside the grounds, the spokesperson notes that this remains a hypothesis to be examined within the framework of the ongoing investigation. He specifies that PNH investigators have, at this stage, found no gas canisters on the site.
Harold Jean also underscores the need to question the organizers in order to gather their account of what transpired.
On Sunday, a journalist working for Radio Spéciale FM, which broadcasts from Milot, went up to the Citadelle. He found about a dozen bodies strewn across the ground.
In driving rain, families gripped by panic were trying to locate their loved ones who had gone missing during the afternoon of the tragedy.
Others, their faces ashen, were carrying bodies wrapped in sheets or laid out on stretchers.
Grief-stricken parents made their way to Milot’s Sacré-Cœur Hospital to recover the bodies of young victims of the incident.
At 11 in the morning the day after the tragedy, the departmental head of Civil Protection, Jean Henri Petit, was still in Cap-Haïtien, due to a vehicle problem that was preventing him from joining his teams already deployed in Milot.
Reached by AyiboPost, the former mayor of Milot, Thélémaque Henry Claude, believes « that responsibilities must be established without delay. »
According to him, since 2021, the central government has entirely abandoned the management of the National Historic Park to the mayor’s office, which lacks the adequate resources to handle it alone.
« For this type of event, there should be a Civil Protection presence on site, as well as security brigades, » adds the man who led the municipality from 2016 to 2026.
The former mayor also points out that it is standard practice to implement a rotation system to regulate access to the site when crowds become too large, in order to prevent an excessive concentration of visitors inside.
Under normal circumstances, authorization to carry out certain activities is granted either by the mayor’s office or by ISPAN. Thélémaque says he does not know whether such authorizations were issued for Saturday’s event.
A tour guide who had been accompanying foreign visitors on the site just a few hours before the tragedy describes to AyiboPost a massive influx of young people and the complete absence of any authority on the premises.
The man, who requested anonymity, indicates that he left the official corps of tour guides overseen by the Ministry of Tourism to create his own independent structure a few years ago.
He explains that he distanced himself from the public institution after coming under attack for having denounced numerous irregularities in the management of the monument.
« When I raised the alarm about the absence of ambulances, doctors, or safety measures at a site of such importance — particularly during periods of high attendance — they chose to attack me instead, » he laments.
In his view, the tragedy that unfolded this Saturday could have been avoided had even minimal safety conditions been in place.
In June 2024, ISPAN had reported the disappearance of two culverins from the site — pieces that were never recovered.
Since that episode, only a single entrance allows access to the building, according to Jean Henri Petit, who believes the State should take charge of organizing the Citadelle celebration. « It should be a national celebration — that is my view, » he says.
Pascal Jolicoeur, a schoolteacher and journalist who was present at the Citadelle, recounts that the exit door of the building was blocked, which forced people to use the same door for both entering and exiting.
People had come from everywhere and traffic jams were widespread throughout the area. A thick fog made it impossible for anyone to identify one another.
« People were starting to collapse, no longer able to breathe. People couldn’t find anyone to help resuscitate them because everyone was trying to flee to safety. There were no ambulances, no first responders at the Citadelle, no National Police officers or authorities of any kind present, » the journalist observes.
The mobilization for the activity at the Citadelle was carried out through social media, including TikTok. The young TikToker Dope Fresh (with more than 800,000 followers) was reportedly set to be a surprise guest, according to a flyer distributed across his platforms.
The mayor’s office says it did not approve the activity, yet the publicity to draw partygoers was carried out through extensive rounds made by cars equipped with powerful loudspeakers in the north. The new mayor says nothing about what he did to prevent the flood of young people from descending on the site.
« Since I have been attending activities at the Citadelle, this is the first time I have ever seen so many people arriving with their sound systems to party there. They were singing all kinds of songs — mostly rabòday. »
By: Fenel Pélissier, Wethzer Piercin, Jérôme Wendy Norestyl & Widlore Mérancourt
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