Five years ago, 10 young people lost their lives at the Travis Scott Astroworld Festival tragedy in Houston, including 23-year-old Madison Dubiski, who attended the event with her younger brother, Ty. Madison never returned home. Six months later, on what would have been Madison’s 24th birthday, her parents, Michelle and Brian Dubiski, together with Ty, established Pink Bows Foundation to honour her memory and advance crowd safety, education and attendee wellbeing.
Since then, the foundation has supported internationally accredited Showstop Procedure training undertaken by more than 1,250 event professionals worldwide, representing organisations collectively responsible for audiences exceeding 100 million people. Pink Bows Safe Space activations have supported more than 450,000 attendees across the United States.
“We cannot change the pain of losing Madison, but we can turn that pain into purpose,” said Michelle Dubiski, co-founder and board vice president of Pink Bows Foundation. “Our mission is to ensure proper safety protocols, training and accountability are in place at all live events, so that every attendee can enjoy these experiences and return home safely to the people who love them.”
Advancing Event Safety Through Education
Following the Astroworld tragedy, internationally recognised crowd safety specialist Steve Allen proposed developing a training program based on his proven Showstop Procedure, after recognising a significant gap in the industry’s approach to managing potentially life-critical incidents. Originally named and pioneered by Allen in the late 1990s while touring with Oasis, the Procedure had since been successfully implemented by him on 32 occasions.
With the support of Pink Bows Foundation, Allen and fellow specialist Dr. Mark Hamilton developed the multi-award winning and internationally accredited Professional Certificate in the Showstop Procedure, launched in March 2025. The training provides a standardised framework for decision-making, communications, timely emergency intervention and the safe resumption of live events when threats to public safety no longer exist.
Importantly, this internationally accredited training program did not exist when Astroworld occurred in 2021. It does today. The program has since been adopted by professionals across major venues, festivals, sporting organisations and public safety agencies worldwide.
Denmark’s Roskilde Festival and Switzerland’s Paléo Festival were among the first European festivals to undertake the training. Roskilde reported: “The Showstop Procedure course has enabled us to reduce the response time to seconds rather than minutes.”
On 19 September 2026, London’s Wembley Stadium incorporated the Showstop Procedure into its emergency arrangements for the Union Jack Classic, establishing documented processes for stopping proceedings across the event’s different operational phases, for a crowd of 46,523.
Showstop courses have been held at venues including Chase Field in Phoenix, Globe Life Field in Arlington, Texas, the Boch Center in Boston and Cardiff City Stadium in Wales. In March 2026, the foundation launched the internationally accredited Introduction to the Showstop Procedure e-learning course, available in nine languages. In 2026, the Showstop Procedure won Best Health and Safety at the Festival Suppliers Awards, and the Health and Safety Award at the Event Production Awards.
Alongside its training initiatives, the Pink Bows Safe Space initiative provides dedicated areas at live events where attendees can access emotional support from licensed mental health professionals and trained volunteers.
Having welcomed more than 450,000 visits, the initiative expanded its reach in 2026, including an activation at the Arizona State Fair in partnership with NAMI Valley of the Sun. The foundation also established a 16-member advisory board of international crowd safety and event security specialists, eight of whom are expert witnesses, to support its strategic objectives and further its mission.
In the past year, Pink Bows Foundation’s leaders and crowd safety experts have also shared the foundation’s prevention mission at major industry events worldwide, including the NCS4 Conference, ILMC, the UKCMA Conference, Pollstar, the Event Production Show and the inaugural Secure Venue Summit.
“Five years is not closure. It is a reminder that Madison should still be here, and that the work we’ve built in her name cannot be the end of the story,” said Brian Dubiski, co-founder and board treasurer of Pink Bows Foundation. “We’ve helped put a clear procedure and training in the hands of event professionals. Now venues and organisers need to use it. That is how we honour Madison and the other nine lives lost.”
To learn more or to support the foundation’s work, visit pinkbowsfoundation.org. For more information about the Showstop Procedure, visit www.showstopprocedure.com.
