The band was revving up the crowd at the private, beachside concert, the lead singer punctuating musical notes with pumping fists We. Are. Seventeen! unaware of the approaching danger.
As he walked across the stage Saturday night, a tsunami hit the shore of Tanjung Lesung beach on the western tip of Java, Indonesia, knocking the stage out from under the band and bringing the concert to a sudden and tragic end.
According to Reuters, four people connected to the band were killed: bassist M. Awal Bani Purbani, road manager Oki Wijaya, guitarist Herman Sikumbang and crew member Ujang.
The band’s drummer was still missing, as was the lead singer’s wife.
The private concert by pop band Seventeen was part of an end-of-year celebration for Perusahaan Listrik Negara, the country’s electricity utility, according to Channel News Asia. Twenty-nine people who attended the show were killed by the tsunami.
By Sunday night, Indonesian government officials said more than 843 people were injured and 28 were missing.
Indonesian officials postulated that a volcanic eruption caused undersea landslides that generated the massive waves, Stanley Widianto reported for The Washington Post.
Indonesia straddles the Pacific Ocean’s Ring of Fire, where many of the world’s volcanic eruptions and earthquakes occur because of collisions between tectonic plates.
In December 2004, a tsunami triggered by a 9.3-magnitude undersea earthquake off the coast of Sumatra killed 168,000 in Indonesia.