What were you doing in the early summer of 2011? I was, like most UFV students, just a kid at the time. When the Canucks went down 3-0 in the second period of Game 7, I did something I would never do now. I turned it off. I went to play street hockey with friends outside.
Before the game ended, turmoil had already begun breaking loose among the estimated crowd of 100,000 people in Vancouver’s downtown core. Leading up to the event, there had been a lot of media discussion around Vancouver’s previous riot in 1994. I think the local media driving theories on how a riot could potentially break out once again essentially served as advertisement for those looking to incite violence in 2011. “If you want to riot, here’s where one will be!”
The volume of people packed into such a small vicinity was an issue that became apparent early in the day. Vancouver lacks a proper space downtown for an appropriate viewing party, which led to viewers climbing onto roofs, bus stops, and light posts, literally people stacked on top of each other to get a view of the game on screen. If you recognize downtown Vancouver, the sight of so many people — seemingly looking for trouble — all stuffed into the fan zone on Georgia street, is quite an astonishing visual.
As a fan I was certainly more than just upset with the loss; the Canucks have only been to three Stanley Cup Finals (SCF) in just over 50 years in the league. Would I ever get to see Vancouver get this close to winning a Cup again before I’m ready to retire? Who knows — that’s how sports work. While being emotional from a loss is understandable, breaking windows to steal clothes from the Bay is not. While it is slightly hilarious, there’s no justification to violently swing the leg of a mannequin through an H&M window. There just isn’t.
Being in that intense of a moment can bring about unexpected responses. While some are captivated by the chaos, and need to take part in any sort of violence they can, there is at least one instance of a man standing up to defend his city. This clip is quite interesting to me, as we see the psyches of two very different types of men clashing against each other: one is doing anything he can to protect his city; the other is doing anything he can to burn it down. What bonds these men? The Vancouver Canucks.
A video of the riot from nearly start to finish was recorded by BCNEWSVIDEO, and documents the captivating collapse of downtown Vancouver. As from the official B.C. Prosecution Service, the city was overtaken by rioters for five hours, three of which are fully recorded. This isn’t the Dark Knight Rises, it’s just about an hour away from home. The footage captured is a remarkable journey to follow. As the cameraman keeps turning corners, there are more and more cars engulfed in flames, and police slowly start pushing people back by horseback. Glass is shattered on every sidewalk, store owners and staff are distraught; I’ve never seen the city look worse. Despite a strong police presence, they were overwhelmed by the crowd and gave no real resistance to abstain from a larger injury count.
In all, there were at least 140 injuries, and 100 arrests the night of the riot. In 2016, after one of the largest investigations in Canadian history, The Province reported that police had laid 912 charges against 300 rioters, with 94 per cent of adult rioters charged receiving jail time.
This is important to realize with the Canucks becoming a contender again: If you act criminally, you will get caught, and you will get charged. Celebrate wins and losses responsibly.
