Thousands of revellers hoping to go to Glastonbury have taken to Twitter to express their frustration – as the festival’s website crashed before tickets went on sale.
Tickets for the festival went on sale at 9am, but by 10:40 all 140,000 tickets had sold out.
The organisers’ website crashed around half an hour before tickets went on sale, as hundreds of thousands of eager fans tried to secure tickets for the landmark music festival.
Phone lines were engaged for hours as people struggled to get through to secure their place among the estimated 140,000 partygoers.
Many were triumphant when they got through online, only to have the page fail to load.
Leila Wright tweeted: “I add my ticket details and then it cancels on me… NOOOOO! #glastonbury”
Alaster Armitage wrote: “Got through to adding registration numbers then bombed out #glastonbury #glastonburytickets”
Ewan Downie: “Just sat for an hour refreshing the page and trying to get through on the phone for Glastonbury tickets! Still managed to get nowhere.”
Tom McLenachan was among the many music fans who feared they might not be able to get tickets.
The 27-year-old dance teacher said: “I tried for hours but I could just not get through.
“It’s ridiculous – you would think they’d be able to sort an easy way for people to get tickets.
“I had three phones and two laptops and nothing happened for what seemed an eternity.
“The phone was engaged and the website kept crashing.
“Luckily, I finally managed to get through after an hour and a half of constant trying.
“It’s such a pain, I don’t even think I’m going to be able to go, but I didn’t want to miss the opportunity.
“I hope they come up with a better way to sell tickets next year – it’s such a ball-ache.”
The festival organisers gave updates to fans throughout the morning on Twitter.
They tweeted: “Sorry for any frustration with the booking site this morning. There is incredible demand, but around half of the tickets have now been sold.”
Ten minutes later, Emily Eavis, daughter of the festival’s founder Michael Eavis, broke the news that all the tickets had been sold out.
She wrote: “Tickets have sold out in 1hr 40mins, thanks to everyone for your support and we are so sorry to those who missed out.
“Sorry to everyone who missed out and for any problems you had with the booking site. There will be a resale in April.”
Tickets were only available to those who had pre-registered on the site, and even then, registration does not guarantee festival tickets.
An official note from farmer Michael Eavis was issued shortly after the sale ended.
It said: “After one hour and 40 minutes, tickets for Glastonbury 2013 have now completely sold out (in record time).
“We would like to say an enormous thanks to everyone who managed to buy a ticket – but we’d also like to extend our sincere apologies to the many thousands who missed out.
“We’re genuinely humbled by the sheer number of people who would like to come to the Festival, and we dearly wish we could have you all along.
“Sadly, that just isn’t possible, which means a significant number of people have missed out.
“Tickets were being sold throughout the morning – but demand simply outstripped supply.”
The Rolling Stones are hotly tipped to headline the annual festival, which was not held this year due to a clash with the London Olympics.
