La Tirana Festival Cancelled

One of Chile’s largest and most colourful religious celebrations has been cancelled this year (2009).

The ‘Fiesta de la Tirana’ is held every 16th of July in honour of the Virgen del Carmen and brings together over 200-250,000 people to a town that normally only has 570 people (that's a three-digit number, not in thousands, of course with a few dogs and chickens thrown in there to beef up the numbers).

Even though 230 religious dance groups had already confirmed their attendance, the Chilean Ministry of Health ‘suspended’ the festival due to the large number of cases of the A/H1N1 Flu virus (Swine Flu) in the region. This is only the second time in the event’s long history that it has been cancelled. The last time was in 1991 due to a Cholera outbreak.

La Tirana, the name of the little town, is in the Tarapacá region in the north of Chile.
(Sorry, no pretty pictures of this festival, we are yet to go!)