All day Saturday, hundreds of thousands of citizens marched through downtown Belgrade in the largest student rally Serbia has seen since the start of protests last November.

The largely peaceful gathering had just entered its seventh hour when students called on the crowd to observe a 15-minute silence to honor the 15 people who were killed when the canopy over the entrance to Novi Sad railway station collapsed on November 1.

People lit up the darkness with their phones, and everyone fell silent.

Then, at precisely 7:11 p.m., panic ensued as a loud noise suddenly came out of nowhere, and people began to flee.

Some videos shared on social media show groups of people suddenly splitting in two........

© Deutsche Welle