Company: Band resisted delaying Ind. concert

INDIANAPOLIS | Country duo Sugarland resisted delaying the start of a concert in August at the Indiana State Fair despite threatening weather that later caused a deadly stage collapse, the fair's top official testified in a lawsuit against the company that built the stage rigging.

During a Jan. 16 deposition, Indiana State Fair Commission Executive Director Cindy Hoye testified a representative for a concert promotion company working with the fair twice approached Sugarland about the fair's desire to delay the show. But Hoye said the band expressed concerns about how a delay would affect the time lead singer Jennifer Nettles needed to warm up and complicate the band's travel to its next show.

"They were trying to get to Iowa to play the Iowa State Fair, and so they said they did not want to delay," Hoye testified as part of a lawsuit filed against Mid-America Sound Corp., which built the roof and rigging used to hold the lights and sound equipment used in the Aug. 13 concert.

The company released a portion of Hoye's deposition Wednesday after the Indiana Occupational Safety and Health Administration fined Mid-America $63,000 for three serious violations of industry standards, which it said contributed to the stage collapse that killed seven people and injured 58 others.

The six-month investigation found the company, the stagehands union and fair officials share blame for the collapse, which occurred when a powerful storm swept into the fairgrounds and knocked over the outdoor stage rigging just before Sugarland was to perform.

Hoye said the fair offered to pay for extra stagehands in Des Moines, Iowa, to reduce the time needed to set up the stage, but the band declined.

Myra Borshoff Cook, a spokeswoman for Mid-America, said the company released Hoye's comments because "we thought it was important for people to see the bigger picture."

Representatives for Sugarland did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press. Stephanie McFarland, a spokeswoman for the fair, also had no immediate response.

State Labor Commissioner Lori Torres said OSHA's report, the first of three independent investigations into the tragedy, was intended to improve workplace safety, not assign blame. However, it issued small fines against the fair, company and union.

The report said Mid-America failed to adequately address safety standards. It found fair officials didn't sufficiently plan for emergencies and were too slow to order an evacuation of the grounds when powerful winds blew in ahead of a storm.

The report also said the union hadn't adequately trained members how to work at heights or provided them with fall protection.

None of that, however, could have necessarily prevented the collapse, Torres said.

OSHA fined the Indiana State Fair Commission $6,300 for failing to conduct proper safety evaluations of its concert venues.

Sugarland was not penalized, though the band has been named in some lawsuits over the accident. The agency said the band didn't employ the workers and wasn't responsible for building the stage.

State officials have hired two out-of-state companies to review the stage collapse and the state's emergency response to the disaster. International engineering firm Thornton Tomasetti is conducting an investigation of the rigging collapse and national emergency planning advisers Witt Associates are reviewing the state's emergency plans and its response to the collapse.