Shaquille O'Neal, "World's Biggest DJ", Performs on Zrće
One of the numerous clubs located on the famous party-beach Zrće, Noa club, organised the inaugural Pow Wow festival this week. The biggest star of the festival, both literally and figuratively, was DIESEL, an African-American DJ of impressive proportions, much more famous under his actual name: Shaquille O'Neal.
Yes, THAT Shaquille O'Neal. After finishing his glorious basketball career, which brought him 4 NBA titles, an MVP title, 15 All-Star game appearances, Olympic and World Championship golds, he didn't start his baseball or golfing careers.
While he was still an active basketball player, he began his second career as a rap singer, but has since shifted his focus and is currently producing and DJing electronic music, performing around the world live under the stage name DIESEL, and calling himself, probably correctly, the World's Biggest DJ.
This July, he has been performing and having what seems to be a lot of fun all over Europe, and every relevant electronic music DJ has to visit Zrće, the mecca of that type of music in Europe. So he flew in to Zadar Airport by private airplane from Sardinia, where he was also performing at a festival, and had a fun day on Pag, sightseeing, supposedly driving around on a rented scooter (too bad there are no photos of that sight!), and in the evening performing as the main event of the night.
Jutarnji list reports that, unlike some other stars who arrive in Croatia, he had no special requests or demands for his stay, that he just really liked the lighting for the performance of another DJ and wanted something similar for his show.
His performance has been described by the Croatian media as packed, very energetic and powerful, and Shaq was giving out autographs all night and seemed to be having a lot of fun himself, while performing, before and after. He posted on his personal Instagram and on his DJing account as well.
Hopefully, the world'sbBiggest DJ will find some time to stay in Croatia for a few more days, as he really seems to enjoy it here.
VIDEO: Zrće Fire Sees Croatian Firemen Showcase Heroism Once Again
More than sixty Croatian firefighters and three canadairs were able to extinguish the shocking fire that went on for about one hour in the woods near Zrće beach in Novalja on the island of Pag.
As 24sata/Bogdan Blotnej/Denis Gascic, Bojana Mrvos Pavic/Antica Vulic writes on the 16th of July, 2019, the fire on Zrće beach had risen to double the height of the pine trees, and a strong bura quickly spread the flames to Zrće's popular Kalypso club. Croatian firefighters managed to successfully defend the club from being engulfed by the inferno at the very last minute.
The fire burned through a relatively untouched and unmanaged pine forest before breaking out and threatening Zrće beach and its numerous popular facilities.
''We managed to stop the fire when it was just 300 metres away from one club,'' said Hrvoje Ostović, the Lika-Senj County Fire Department's commander.
The problem was that there were about 10,000 people on Zrće beach at the time the fire broke out, who came to the Fresh Island Festival and to visit the Papaja and Kalypso nightclubs. The Croatian firefighters, helped by the police, had to evacuate them because of the strong bura that had changed the direction of the approaching flames. Even though they had started to tackle the fire, people's help was also sought through social networks. At approximately 02:30, an appeal was sent out from the Kalypso club.
''Kalypso is endangered by fire! Whoever can, please come and help to defend the club!'' read the post.
The fun quickly came to a halt and everyone had to run. Within ten minutes, people headed to the other beach and then to the buses heading away from Zrće. Firefighters literally attacked the fire from the very beach and prevented it from approaching the clubs at all.
At one point, the flames even reached the substation, but they managed to rescue the situation. Additional help from Zadar County and Zadar fire departments arrived, as did additional forces from Lika-Senj County.
''Even when the fire was being successfully tackled we noticed a large number of people who were in the woods,'' Ostović said. That is why policemen who helped went into the forest to evacuate them.
"You can only imagine what that looked like, it was at night, the bura was blowing, the fire was burning, and then we managed to evacuate the young people, first to the neighbouring beach, where there's no forest, and then, when the fire calmed down, at dawn when the Canadairs came, evacuation towards the town of Novalja began,'' said Novalja's mayor Ante Dabo.
He thanked the firefighters for their selfless sacrifice, as well as the people on the island as a whole, who showed complete solidarity. After nearly five hours of attempting to kill the fire during the night, with the arrival of dawn, the firefighters managed to regroup. Two canadairs arrived at dawn.
''Immediately upon arrival at the fire's location we saw how it had evolved from Zrće and had headed in the direction of Novalja. It burst through the road leading to Novalja and it's very good that we arrived at that moment because we stopped it right there. We continued to fight it and helped the firefighters keep it under control,'' said the captain of the canadair crew, Major Tomislav Slavica. Eventually, a third canadair arrived. Together, they released a total of 470 tons of water onto the flames.
''We're tired. We were out on the field for twelve hours without stopping. The forests in Dalmatia are greatly appreciated, and this is a huge pity,'' said Goran Podunavac from the Novalja fire department.
''We've been there since the morning. It's still smoldering everywhere, we're trying stop the fire from beginning again,' said four firefighters from the Pag fire department.
Ivan Orlić, Toni Sabolić i Neno Buljanović arrived at the fire's location near Caska beach. They were aided by their colleague Željko Smojben from the Senj fire department.
''We went with our backpacks to the edges and manually started attacking the fire. We were putting the fire out for an hour, then resting for half an hour, then starting again from scratch,'' explained one of the firemen when detailing their method.
There was also deputy chief of police Željko Prša, who hadn't commented on the causes of the fire, saying only that it was caused by humans, either purposely or accidentally. He has denied any speculation of arrests having been made.
''I hope everyone is safe. Try not to breathe in the smoke. Cover your nose and mouth with your shirts and whatever you can,'' wrote the British rapper Luke Olanrewaju B Odunaike (21) on the night of the fire, better known under the name of Not3s.
He appeared only a few moments before the fire broke out, and of course the organisers stopped everything. The famous rapper Micheal Ray Stevenson (29), who is known to the public under the name Tyga, was also set to play on Zrće. His performance was postponed, and the "curse" of the Fresh Island festival continued. Chris Brown's performance was also stopped back in 2016 because of the bura.
''I've never seen a fire like that in my life, it was everywhere, it was terrible! I wasn't afraid until my friend said: 'Kim, it's going to burn us all,' then, I was more frightened than I've ever been in my life,'' said Kim Buneta (22), a girl from Rijeka who works at the Kalypso club on Zrće beach.
As we reported earlier, it turns out that the fire was caused by humans, but whether or not it was an accident is yet to be determined. The police continue to maintain that no arrests have been made.
Police Confirm That Fire on Zrće Was Caused by Human Factor
Yesterday, we reported on the fire that broke out on the famous Zrće beach in Novalja on the island of Pag. The fire started in a nearby pine forest, it appears that the nobody was hurt, that facilities are safe, and that everyone was successfully evacuated via a praiseworthy joint effort from police and firemen.
Wildfires do happen, especially on the Croatian coast. The dry trees in the characteristic dense pine forests can easily get too hot and spark a fire, but as we've seen before with the devastating fires in previous years down in Dalmatia, they can also have a human cause. The cause of the Zrće fire, sadly appears to have a darker side to it.
As Morski writes on the 16th of July, 2019, Željko Prša, the deputy chief of police, told RTL that the police, with the help of expert witnesses from the Ivan Vučetić Centre for Criminal Investigation, found the location from which the big fire which began in the early hours of the morning on the 16th of July, began. It unfortunately seems that the fire on Zrće beach was caused by a human factor, more precisely by an open flame.
It seems that it was most likely that it was a cigarette butt that was thrown twenty or thirty metres from the sea near Caska beach. Prša said that no arrests have yet been made, but that they have a lot of eyewitnesses and the police are still talking with them.
It was found that the Zrće fire was caused by a human factor, but it still needs to be determined whether it was intentional or simply accidental. The fire started from the grass, but the strong bura unfortunately blew the flames around, giving strength to the fire, and quickly saw it set the pine forest close to Zrće beach alight.
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Fire on Zrće Beach Under Control, Over 10,000 People Evacuated
As Dnevnik writes on the 16th of July, 2019, at about 01:00, a fire broke out in a pine forest on the famous Zrće beach in Novalja on the island of Pag. Visitors were evacuated and the extinguishing of the fire was progress, the police reported this morning.
Due to the presence of the firefighting vehicles, traffic between Pag-Novalja above Zrće beach was halted for several hours, and traffic is now permitted along one lane, with police regulation.
"The fire was stopped at around 300 metres from a hospitality facility, what was most difficult to deal with was the wind direction, and we can't be sure if evacuation is necessary in those cases. However, they decided to evacuate and that was the best choice. The clubs were not threatened.
A large number of people were in the woods so the police had a lot of work to do, and the co-ordination of the firefighters and police officers was excellent. People were fleeing because the fire had spread in all directions and nobody knew where to go,'' Hrvoje Ostović of the Lika-Senj fire department added.
Željko Prša of the police said that the source and cause of the fire is yet to be determined.
"Whether the fire was purposeful or not will be seen after the fire is extinguished and we start looking for witnesses. When we know the conditions to see what has happened are secure, then we'll see. It's too early to talk about whether the fire was started purposely or not. There were thirty or forty policemen on the ground, and together with the firemen, they did the best job they could. Some of the people who were here got disoriented and went off into the woods, some of them were curious and wanted to see what it was all about - we've got all of them back to safety,'' he said.
"All three Canadairs have been returned back to base, the fire is under the control of the firefighters and they're putting it out, and all the tourists and the employees of the clubs that were in Zrće have been evacuated," stated a statement from MUP.
Foreign media have reported on the fire on Pag, as there are many foreign tourists in Novalja, and the Fresh Island Festival was also being held.
It's a whole forest fire at #freshisland pic.twitter.com/TRSGDIegTG
— Antonio Simmons (@antonio_simmons) July 15, 2019
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