Apollo Theatre collapse: 'We thought it was hail on the roof... then the whole thing fell' At that moment someone in the front row got up, and I suddenly got the creeps and sensed something was wrong. That was when the whole thing fell. Part of me knew it was about to collapse and I don't know why I didn't just get out. Everything went black. Most of the lights were out and people in the stalls would have found it hard to get out because there was thick soot in the air. People just panicked and everyone was barging past each other, people were screaming and just trying to get to the exits as fast as they could. I think a survival mode just kicked in. They certainly weren't leaving in an orderly fashion. Where the ceiling had been there was just a ghastly black hole. I was worried the balcony might collapse or catch fire, because there were a lot of black pipes or wires dangling from the ceiling, which I thought might have been electrical cables. I couldn't see what was going on below, I could only see people when they came out. One or two were bleeding, and they were all just covered in thick black dust. My sister in law was sitting in the row in front of me, in row A, and she got covered in dust, that was how close we were to it. Luckily she wasn't injured. The emergency services were there within seconds. When I got out everyone was standing outside with their faces covered in dust. It does make you a little bit nervous about all these ancient London theatres.