PENDLETON, Ore. – Maroon 5 was the headliner of the Pendleton Whisky Music Festival which was held at the Round-Up Stadium on July 15, 2017 in Pendleton, Oregon. According to staff at the ticket booth the event was sold-out and said that over 16,500 tickets had been sold.
A group of women said that they had been waiting for the gates to open since seven in the morning. The friends were from places as diverse as Portland, Oregon and San Diego, California. They claimed to have traveled over 5,000 miles attending every west-coast stop of the Maroon V Tour between 2005-16.
Before the concert ended a man on a bicycle rode up to the front gates of the stadium with two Little Caesars pepperoni pizzas “exchanging free slices of pizza for $2 tips.” His pitch was that “Little Caesars is closed.” A few concertgoers hurled insults and obscenities at him but within fifteen minutes he had “exchanged” all of his slices for “tips.” A Little Caesars pizza is cut into eight slices and costs $6.
At 11 p.m. police had the area between the intersection of SW Court Ave. and SW 10th Street and the Pendleton Convention Center closed to traffic so that concertgoers could disperse. An officer was directing the flow of pedestrians heading downtown and a line of vehicles ran to SW 8th Street.
Illegal fireworks could be seen flying overhead and heard in the distance. Firefighter Mark Lewis said that he couldn’t tell where the fireworks were coming from but that “if [anyone sees the culprits] tell them to please stop.”