Burning Man attendee dies at festival after medical emergency

A man died while attending the annual Burning Man festival in the Nevada desert this week, the festival said Thursday.

The festivalgoer was described as being in his mid-50s and had a medical emergency at the event, it said in a statement.

He “immediately received lifesaving measures, and was transported to the onsite center for emergency care where he was pronounced deceased,” the festival said.

The man’s identity was being withheld until family could be notified, it said. The Pershing County Sheriff’s Office, which doubles as the region’s medical examiner, did not immediately respond to a request for information.

The cause and manner of death have not been released.

“The safety and well-being of our community and staff remain our highest priority,” the festival said.

The death came as the festival endured another year with weather woes, including rain on Friday that temporarily closed a main gate to festival grounds known as Black Rock City.

By 6 p.m. on Friday the gate was reopened, organizers said in a discussion board post. The National Weather Service called for blowing dust early Friday evening and a 20% chance of rain on Sunday for nearby Gerlach, Nevada, a community of 58 people about 100 miles north of Reno.

The festival, with a capacity of 80,000 people, also was hit with mud and rain in 2023 as many attendees were trapped on its grounds, where vehicle traffic was temporarily limited and some hiked in the mud to nearby towns.

Burning Man kicked off Aug. 30 and is scheduled through Sept. 7.

The post-hippie, psychedelic festival of DJ-performed music, art installations, and temporary communal living takes place each year on 3,400 acres of dry lake and desert land in northern Nevada run by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management.

It’s celebrating its 40th year, with its roots in a 1986 gathering on San Francisco’s Baker Beach said to have drawn roughly 20 people for the planned, bonfire burning of an 8-foot wooden structure known as “the Man.”