Radio Quito's War of the Worlds broadcast

On the twelfth of February, 1949, Radio Quito aired a live drama about an alien invasion in Quito, Ecuador. When listeners learned it was fiction, a mob attacked the station's building, and six or more people died.

Radio Ambulante, in a 2020 audio piece, describes a radio drama broadcast live in Quito, Ecuador, on the twelfth of February, 1949. Radiolab says Radio Quito adapted the Welles stunt for listeners in Ecuador. A War of the Worlds site says the city then had about 250,000 people and that the broadcast came from the city's main radio station. Wikipedia adds that the newspaper El Comercio, which owned the station, had published false reports of unidentified objects over Ecuador in the days before.

The Miami Herald, quoting Jorge Ribadeneira, who was 19 at the time, recorded that it was a Saturday night. A live concert was under way when an announcer cut in on the musicians to say a huge cylinder-shaped object had landed in the countryside above the capital city.

According to Wikipedia, once listeners learned the broadcast was fiction, panic turned into a riot, and hundreds of people turned on both Radio Quito and El Comercio. Radio Ambulante describes the crowd shouting "Fire!", entering the first floor, wrecking the machines and setting fire to everything, with gasoline cans brought in as more people joined. The death toll varies by source: Wikipedia and Radiolab say at least seven people died, and the War of the Worlds site says six or more. Wikipedia adds that Radio Quito went silent for two years and returned in 1951.