The perils of inviting "everyone'' to a teenage party in the modern world of social networking Web sites and radio shout-outs were dramatically illustrated over the weekend when more than 500 gatecrashers trashed a country house.
Thousands of dollars of damage was done and partygoers broke windows and tore out curtains at Georgian Colehayes Park in Devon, England, a building run as a field study center by descendants of the industrialist who first mass-produced tarpaulin.
Initially blamed on BBC Radio 1, which featured the private function on a "shout-out'' -- where listeners tell the world about cool things going on -- the chaos proved yesterday to have snowballed from an ill-advised poster hung at Torquay Grammar School. It was pinned up by Sarah Ruscoe, who invited one and all to her 18th birthday fancy dress bash, which she presided over dressed as a dominatrix.
"Little did I know almost everyone from my year would attend and what is more invite `everyone' from different schools and the surrounding area," she said ruefully, as her family struggled to cope with smashed furniture and beer-sprayed walls. "Admittedly, perhaps I was foolish and naive but how often does a poster cause chaos and devastation?"
She then provided the answer, in a world hooked together by MySpace, Facebook and school bulletin boards, as well as DJ Pete Tong on Radio 1.
"Perhaps it is when a large circle of friends, social networking sites and even the radio make communication that much more efficient," she said.
The BBC declined to apologize over the shout-out, in which Tong chattered cheerily about a party at Bovey Tracey, the Devon town close to Colehayes Park.
Carloads of teenagers then jammed the drive through Colehayes' 8 hectare park, overwhelming four bouncers, and later evading police with dogs, over a chaotic four hours.
Sarah's mother Rebecca Brooks, 54, who is considering action against the BBC, said: "It was terrifying, absolutely terrifying. The droves of people coming towards the house were frightening. It looked like we had a rock festival here."
Her husband Bill, 75, who bought the house nine years ago, said that the gatecrashers had acted "like animals," smashing furniture and windows and pelting police with glass.
A BBC spokeswoman said that Colehayes had not been identified in the shout-out
The event was already in danger of "spiraling out of control" in the last few days, Ruscoe said.
She said she had got friends to spread rumors last week that the party had been postponed.
"By the last day I felt physically ill with worry. I was dreading the night, but didn't expect it to turn out as bad as it did," she said.
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