‘All hell broke loose’: Hundreds of Leeds students gather for snowball fight

Organisers attempted to keep the event ‘socially distanced’


Hundreds of Leeds students battled it out in a Hyde Park snowball fight after a Facebook event, which has since been deleted, amassed hundred of likes. The event told students it was time to finally decide which uni “reigns supreme” in a battle between the University of Leeds and Leeds Beckett University.

Despite organisers’ attempts to keep the gathering Covid-secure, many participants were seen without masks.

Image via Twitter

The event, which began as a joke post in the Leeds Student Group on Facebook, gained nearly 200 likes in 10 minutes. It was posted at around 11am this morning. The post has since amassed over 700 likes.

The post has since amassed over 700 likes from Facebook users

The battle’s organiser told The Leeds Tab: “I didn’t think it would become as big as it did. I made sure to tell everyone to wear masks and to social distance in the event description. Snowballs are dangerous enough.”

The event details read: “In case you all haven’t noticed, it’s fucking Narnia outside and it would be silly not to take advantage to not only have a bit of fun, but also finally decide who reigns supreme. Beckett or Uni of Leeds.

“So grab your gloves (and your masks) and assemble your respective Russel [sic] and poly armies.

“This can count as your legally allowed daily exercise.”

Videos have since circulated around Snapchat, TikTok, and Twitter of groups of students pelting each other from their respective battlefronts. Captions included “National lockdown who”. One TikTok of the event has almost 60,000 views.

A source claims that the fight started with “two sides separated by a big clearing” before “all hell broke loose and it was just a free for all.”

One student who attended described the scenes: “It was mad, people were just charging and people brought frying pans and baking trays.”

But others expressed their discontent in Facebook comments, with one slamming the event, posting “yes, because what we need right now is a mass gathering of people without masks on.”

No authorities attempted to break up the fight and participants were described by an atendee to have been in “great spirits” even if they were being “pelted by snowballs.”