Taylor Swift Austria Update
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Taylor Swift Austria Update

Not long after news broke that Taylor Swift canceled the Austrian leg of her ERAS Tour due to a terrorist threat, new updates are rolling in regarding the delicate and frightening situation.

According to Omar Haijawi-Pirchner, the head of Austria's Directorate of State Security and Intelligence, the two suspects were housing bomb-making materials, and the primary suspect – who is only 19 years old and had been radicalized online "in the direction of the Islamic State" – said he planned to kill as many as he possibly could (and also himself), using homemade explosives, chemicals, and knives. In addition to him, there are two younger suspects who have also been taken into custody – a 17- and a 15-year-old, the latter of whom is from Turkey.

The suspects confessed to their plot. The 19-year-old suspect had recently quit his job, and had told people he was "planning something." The 17-year-old had worked for a company that would have provided facilities services to the stadium. The suspects had also reportedly drastically altered their appearances in the time leading up to the planned attack.

Ernst Happel Stadium; via iStock

It should also be noted that the plan was to take place outside the concert venue.

More details will likely keep trickling in, but as it stands now, it sounds like a terrifying and horrible attack was, thankfully, thwarted.

Taylor Swift is still on schedule to perform in London from August 15 - 20.

The facts in this article are according to the BBC, ABC News, and CNN. This is an ongoing, developing story.


The Needle Drop may earn an affiliate commission via purchases on ticket links through this article.

Jeremy J. Fisette

Connecticut

Writer, musician, editor, podcaster. Editor-in-chief & video editor of The Needle Drop.

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