It began with an invitation made through the TikTok application, so that whoever wanted to attend the birthday party of a young man named Adrian Lopez.
It ended with
121 adults and 28 teens arrested for vandalism,
curfew violation, fireworks offenses and refusal to disperse from a crowded place.
The video posted last Wednesday on TikTok, for the 'AdriansKickBack' party, was viewed more than 180 million times on the popular video app before being removed.
At least 2,500 people out of millions of views turned out for the meeting in Huntington Beach, south of Los Angeles, California, on Saturday.
In videos taken at night, young people are seen climbing poles and palm trees, firing pyrotechnics and jumping from bridges.
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The authorities had warned since Friday night, when a hundred people arrived early at the site, that there would be a curfew and that the event would be considered an act of illegal assembly.
Huntington Beach Police also warned that the consumption of alcohol, drugs and any fireworks is prohibited on the beach.
During the festivities, businesses in downtown Huntington Beach were vandalized, as were police vehicles and a lifeguard tower on the beach, district police spokeswoman Jennifer Carey told NBC News.
It is not the first time that
a party called through TikTok or exhibited in videos of the application has attracted the attention of the authorities.
Video footage captured during the night of Saturday, May 22, in Huntington Beach.Eyepress via Reuters
Over the past summer, despite the COVID-19 pandemic, several popular users of the app living in shared houses such as Sway House and Hype House threw massive parties.
Two popular figures on TikTok, Bryce Hall and Blake Gray, were charged with misdemeanors for one of those parties, with the possibility that they would have to pay a fine of $ 2,000 each.
Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti ordered water access to the house where Hall and Gray live cut off to discourage clandestine parties.
But the risk of contagion does not appear to have stopped the hundreds of people who flocked to Huntington Beach this Saturday.
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"We just want to go and have fun, keep having parties, because we lost that last year with COVID
," a person who was at the party, Erica Ramirez, told CBS Los Angeles.
Huntington Beach recently emerged from the maximum emergency declaration,
purple tier
, which reduced site operations due to a surge in coronavirus infections in California.
It is currently at the yellow alert level with which a greater reopening of businesses is allowed and that there are services in covered areas instead of just outdoors.
With information from AP and NBC News