Vienna ticket holders feel both disappointment and relief

Taylor Swift fans with tickets to her concerts in Vienna have said they are “devastated” that the shows have been cancelled, but that they understand why and are grateful to police.

Austrian authorities have has said a supporter of the Islamic State group was planning an attack on her stadium shows, which were due to take place on Thursday, Friday and Saturday.

About 250,000 fans were expected to attend across the three nights, which are part of the US superstar’s record-breaking Eras tour.

They include Jessica Holroyd, who had flown to the city for the gig from Bristol.

“I found out the news when I was in the airport, and I had a bit of a cry in the airport toilets,” she said.

“It’s all quite emotional. I’ve been a fan since I was 15 and I’m 32 soon, so it’s just quite devastating, really.”

Ms Holroyd said the gigs were “such a momentous occasion for loads of people”.

“It feels like it might be the only opportunity to see her, particularly the Eras tour, so it just feels like a huge loss.”

However, she said she thought Austrian police had “handled it really well”.

“And as sad as it is, it seems like the best decision for everyone’s safety – the fans and the crew and Taylor, of course. It’s not worth the loss of life.”

Fellow Swiftie Natascha Strobl, an Austrian political scientist and author, was planning to go to two of the three gigs, and said she was “absolutely devastated”.

“I was looking forward to it for over a year, and made bracelets and planned outfits and planned the whole day,” she told BBC News.

“There are people sitting in hotel rooms who don’t know what to do, people who are supposed to fly over who don’t know what to do now. They’re in shock. There’s a lot of crying, of course.”

But she agreed that there could be “no debate when it comes to security”.

“If it’s not safe, it’s not safe,” she said, explaining that no-one could risk the prospect of a repeat of previous “devastating and shocking” atrocities like at Manchester arena, when 22 people were killed in a suicide bombing at an Ariana Grande concert in 2017.

Last week, three young girls were killed in a knife attack on a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in Southport.

“Of course, safety is paramount,” she said. “But still, we’re allowed to feel absolutely terrible about it.”

The news about the Vienna plotters has made people more nervous, she said.

“That’s what they want. They want to make us feel unsafe. They want to disturb our everyday life. So they won at least a little bit. And that’s just heartbreaking.

“I want to meet up with the others [fans] and at least console ourselves and be sad together, because we really, really wanted to go to the concerts, and being sad alone in our homes or hotel rooms is not helping anybody.”

Another fan, Nelo, had been planning to travel from his home in Slovenia.

“We were all preparing. We were all making the costumes. And we’ve been doing this for weeks, for months,” he told BBC Radio 5 Live’s Adrian Chiles.

“It’s a big thing in life for such a concert to happen so nearby. So we were all very excited, really putting a lot of effort in.

“Then yesterday in the evening, we heard the first of the news that there were terrorists arrested. We were in a bit of in disbelief but we thought, OK, they’re going to heighten up the security measures and everything will be OK.

“But then we heard late in the evening that actually it’s all been cancelled, and it suddenly dawned upon us that the situation is really serious.”

Two suspects, aged 19 and 17, have been arrested.

The head of Austria’s domestic intelligence service, Omar Haijawi-Pirchner, told a news conference the 19-year-old had planned to carry out an attack using explosives and knives.

“We have seized these weapons and he considered either possibility and his goal was to kill himself and a large number of people either today or tomorrow at the concert,” Mr Haijawi-Pirchner said.

Austrian Interior Minister Gerhard Karner said: “The situation was serious, but a tragedy had been prevented.”

Swift said in a 2019 interview that an attack on one of her gigs was “her biggest fear”.

“After the Manchester Arena bombing and the Vegas concert shooting [also in 2017], I was completely terrified to go on tour this time because I didn’t know how we were going to keep three million fans safe over seven months,” she told Elle at the time.

“There was a tremendous amount of planning, expense, and effort put into keeping my fans safe.”

The next concerts in the singer’s schedule are in London, with five nights at Wembley Stadium from next Thursday.

A spokesman for the city’s Metropolitan Police said it worked “closely with venue security teams and other partners to ensure there are appropriate security and policing plans in place”.

They added: “There is nothing to indicate that the matters being investigated by the Austrian authorities will have an impact on upcoming events here in London.

“As always, we will continue to keep any new information under careful review.”

Chris Phillips, former head of the National Counter Terrorism Security Office, said the incident was “another reminder if we need it that terrorism and Islamic terrorism in particular is still an issue”.

However, he said fans going to the UK gigs should be “no more [worried] today than you were yesterday”, he told 5 Live.

“There’s an enormous amount of work behind the scenes which you’ll never hear about, and you don’t even see the results because a success is when nothing happens,” he said.

“I imagine as well that Taylor Swift, after the recent events in Southport, would be particularly sensitive to anything like this happening, and so would her management team.

“So maybe that’s the rationale behind cancelling these, particularly if they’ve arrested the two suspects.”