At least 47 people were killed at a soccer match at Ellis Park here last night in a stampede triggered by desperate fans trying to get into the stadium and aggravated by frightened spectators trapped against the outer fence trying to wriggle to safety.
Horrified television viewers watched as the match - between arch-rivals, Orlando Pirates and Kaiser Chiefs - was abandoned as the extent of the disaster, the worst in South African soccer history, became apparent. Officials, aware that it could get worse if there the panic spread into the seated crowd, tried to bring calm to the eddies of people swirling around to avoid being crushed.
In surreal scenes the bodies of dead people were brought onto the field and covered with blankets. The South African Broadcasting Corporation, whose television crews were there in strength, reported that the primary cause of the stampede was the overselling of tickets.
People with tickets but still outside the grounds pushed forward, only to find themselves trapped against the fence. Ellis Park is best known as the venue for rugby internationals and the scene of South Africa's narrow win over New Zealand in the 1995 World Cup final. But with the collapse of apartheid it has increasingly served as the sporting battleground for soccer teams, soccer being the number sport of the black majority.
The Sports Minister, Mr Ngconde Balfour, who was present at the game, concurred with the overcrowding analysis. "There were more supporters than the stadium could hold," he said. "It resulted in people being crush and injured. There are plus-minus 50 deaths and more injured."
At the two main hospitals in Johannesburg and at the main mortuary, anxious knots of people waited to see whether missing relatives and friends were among the injured and dead.
President Thabo Mbeki, who was watching televised coverage of the game, a critical league match between the long time rivals and their huge contingent of dedicated and excitable followers, reacted by assuring the nation that an urgent inquiry would be held into the disaster to ensure that it did not happen again.
He expressed shock at the loss of so many lives on what should have been an exciting, carefree occasion.
The opposition Democratic Alliance shared Mr Mbeki's sense of shock and supported his call for an urgent inquiry. "It appears as if the authorities are still not able to accommodate and deal with large crowds," Mr Douglas Gibson of the Alliance said.
The rising death toll was announced at regular intervals to the crowd. The bosses of the two teams, Mr Ivan Khoza of Pirates and Mr Kaiser Motaung of Kaiser Chief, addressed the crowd, expressing their condolences to those who had lost loved one and appealing for calm and an orderly departure from the stadium.
Johannesburg Hospital's car park was turned into a receiving area as ambulances and helicopters brought in those injured. A child apparently no more than seven years old and bundled in a red blanket was handed down from an ambulance to a nurse who hurried inside. At one point, 10 ambulances were in the car park while a helicopter hovered above.