DOVER, De. -- The Kent County Department of Public Safety reported 250 medical emergencies from the Phish Festival. A lot of those were either heat exhaustion or alcohol poisoning, but EMS workers and law enforcement handled several overdoses.
Among the rock music and smiling faces at the Dover Speedway, police said a lot of illegal drugs were part of the party. Drugs seized included LSD, mushrooms and nitrous oxide.
"What was unique with this one is a lot of nitrous, really big with I guess these types of festivals which is something that we hadn't seen before, like with Firefly when we had it for ten years," said Ryan Schmid, Master Corporal PIO with the Dover Police Department. "Just a different aspect, a different crowd, a different drug of choice I guess."
While nitrous is new to the Dover festival scene, Kevin Sipple, Director of the Kent County Department of Public Safety, said they were prepared.
"Our paramedic administration did some review into that and we actually had provided our paramedics and first responders with a PowerPoint on how to deal with the nitrous issues," said Sipple.
Police did arrest five people throughout the festival for various drug related charges. Two of the five were caught with nitrous tanks.
Compared to Firefly, the nitrous was new, but the amount of drug arrests were not.
"What we put out today, the five arrests that we made related to drugs, that's pretty on-par with what we've done in the past," said Schmid.
Both the police department and Kent County Department of Public Safety said they would happily welcome the Phish festival back. The agencies said overall, the festival was a good experience and it's good for Dover businesses.