San Fermín 2020: The Year the Fiesta Stopped
July 6 to 14, 2020. No chupinazo. No encierros. No crowds on Estafeta. The first year since 1938 that the fiesta was not held, and the first year with no running of the bulls since then.
Curated by Dennis Clancey
· Founder of Encierro, veteran bull runner
First Year Without the Fiesta Since 1938
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COVID-19
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No Encierros
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July 6 to 14, 2020
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No Bulls Ran
From the founderLooking Back on the Year It Went Quiet
Dennis Clancey · Founder, Encierro
I remember the moment I read that they had cancelled it. I knew Spain was in serious trouble with the pandemic, and I knew the odds were not good, but there was still a part of me that thought they would find a way.
When the announcement came on April 21, a Tuesday morning, I sat with it for a while. Not just because we had no business to run that July, but because of what it meant: no Estafeta, no pens opening, no one singing the prayer at the statue. The streets I know better than most streets in my own city were going to be empty on the morning of July 7. No bulls. No runners. No sound except the police patrols and the wind.
What I kept coming back to was what a veteran runner named Carmelo Buttini Echarte said at the time. He had not missed a run in 40 years. He said he could not hold back his tears when he heard the news. I understood that completely. There is a community of people around the encierro for whom those nine July mornings in Pamplona are not a bucket list moment but a way of life, and in 2020 that way of life was taken away. Not by choice, but by a virus that had already killed tens of thousands of people in Spain by the time the decision was made.
I watched the clips from July 6 and 7 from afar. The 400 people in the Plaza Consistorial at noon. The small group in white and red on the running of the bulls route chanting the prayer on an empty street. It was hard to watch, and in a way it mattered to watch it. San Fermín 2020 was not nothing. It was a year the city grieved a tradition, and it grieved it out loud.
Dennis Clancey, Founder, Encierro
2020 in contextThe Weight of What Was Lost
On 21 April 2020, acting mayor Ana Elizalde stepped to a Pamplona microphone and announced that the fiesta was suspended. She described the decision as “hard and sad.” Mayor Enrique Maya was not at the press conference: he was at home recovering from COVID-19 himself. Spain had been under a national lockdown since March 14. The fiesta that draws 1.45 million visitors to Pamplona every July could not happen.
It was the first year since 1938 that San Fermín was not held, and the first year with no encierros since 1938.
On the morning of July 6, 2020, the balcony was empty.The path to cancellation
COVID in Spain and Navarra: The Timeline
Navarra was among the regions hit in the first phase of the outbreak.
Navarra confirmed its first case on 29 February 2020. In the first wave (February to June 2020), the region recorded 10,358 confirmed cases, 1,943 hospitalisations and 529 confirmed COVID-19 deaths. Excess deaths over the same period numbered 613, and 58 per cent of the COVID-19 deaths were among nursing home residents.
On 14 March 2020, the Spanish government declared the estado de alarma (state of alarm). On 2 April, Spain recorded 950 deaths in a single 24-hour period, a new one-day record for the country. On 25 March, Spain's official death toll had already surpassed that of mainland China.
The estado de alarma ended on 21 June 2020. Spain entered what it called "new normality." But no normality could restore the fiesta. The announcement of cancellation had come two months earlier, in April, when it was already clear that gathering 1.45 million people in a medieval city centre in July was not possible.
29 February 2020
Navarra's first confirmed COVID-19 case.
14 March 2020
Spain declares the estado de alarma.
25 March 2020
Spain's official COVID-19 death toll surpasses that of mainland China.
2 April 2020
Spain records 950 deaths in 24 hours, a new one-day record for the country.
21 April 2020
Acting mayor Ana Elizalde announces the cancellation of San Fermín 2020 at a Pamplona press conference. Mayor Enrique Maya is at home with COVID-19. The decision is described as “hard and sad.”
21 June 2020
The estado de alarma expires. Spain enters "new normality" two weeks before the dates on which San Fermín would have been held. The cancellation stands.
6 July 2020
The hour of the chupinazo passes in near-silence. The Ayuntamiento lets 400 people into the Plaza Consistorial, its capacity limit, and they wave red kerchiefs. City Hall unfurls the #LosViviremos banner: "We will live them." The first encierro date, 7 July, passes with a small group gathering on the empty route to chant the traditional prayer.
Earlier Cancellations, and Then 2020
The fiesta was not held in 1937 and 1938. No chupinazo, no encierros.
In 1978 the fiesta was suspended partway through, after a fatal incident on July 8. In 1997 the corrida of 12 July and the Miura encierro of 13 July were suspended after a local political figure was killed: 1997 was a partial suspension, not a full cancellation.
So what made 2020 different from every year since 1938 was the absence of the encierros themselves. No bulls. No runners. No morning sprint down Santo Domingo and Estafeta. The route would have been the same 848.6 metres it always is. The fence would have gone up. And then the pandemic made all of it impossible, and the streets that had carried bulls every July for decades went quiet.
The fence would have gone up. The morning of July 7 came and went in silence.Pamplona in July 2020
Empty Streets, and Those Who Still Came
The Municipal Police mounted an operation to control crowd density in the Old Town: 14 checkpoints at the entry and exit points of the key streets, with six capacity-control zones in the bar-heavy areas. The Plaza Consistorial was capped at 400 people. Loudspeakers facing the street were banned. Establishments were asked not to play traditional fiesta music on July 6 and 7. No street lunches were authorised. Indoor venues were capped at 75 per cent capacity.
At noon on 6 July, the 400 people the Ayuntamiento allowed into the Plaza Consistorial stood and waited for a chupinazo that did not come. Some of them waved red kerchiefs. The City Council had unfurled a large banner on the Town Hall facade in the shape of a kerchief, reading #LosViviremos: "We will live them." The message was in Spanish, Basque, French, and English.
On the morning of 7 July, the date the first encierro would have run, a small group dressed in the traditional white and red gathered at the assembly point on the route and chanted the oración a San Fermín, the prayer that runners sing to the image of the saint before every run. The streets were otherwise empty.
The human costWhat the Community Lost
The runners
Forty Years Without a Gap, and Then This
Veteran bull runner Carmelo Buttini Echarte, 52, told NBC News he could not hold back his tears when the cancellation was announced. He had not missed a run in 40 years. As the fiesta dates approached he kept his countdown clock running in protest, a gesture that spoke for a community of dedicated runners for whom the July mornings are not a trip but a vocation.
The city's economy
Up to 150 Million Euros Lost
Estimates put the total economic cost at up to 150 million euros. Bars and hotels in Pamplona reported that the fiesta typically accounts for 15 to 20 per cent of their annual revenue. The hospitality sector had already lost its Easter trade to lockdown restrictions.
The peñas and the tradition
The Visitors Who Did Not Come
The 1.45 million visitors who would normally have come, from across Spain and from dozens of countries, did not come. For many of the restaurateurs, hoteliers, and small traders who depend on July, the loss was existential.
The Ranches That Waited for 2022
No encierros ran in 2020. These eight ranches ran when the fiesta returned in 2022.
Miura
Closed the 2022 fiesta on July 14.
Cebada Gago
First ran the Pamplona encierro in 1985, and ran on July 11, 2022.
Jandilla
Ran on July 12, 2022.
Fuente Ymbro
Did not run in 2019, when La Palmosilla took its place; ran on July 8, 2022.
Núñez del Cuvillo
Ran the first encierro of 2022, on July 7.
Victoriano del Río
Ran on July 13, 2022, the fastest run of that year.
José Escolar
Debuted in Pamplona in 2015 and ran on July 9, 2022.
La Palmosilla
Debuted in 2019 and ran on July 10, 2022.
On the official cartel (poster): No official poster was selected for San Fermín 2020. The public voting competition was not held. The Pamplona city archive of carteles (pamplona.es/turismo/sanfermin/carteles) lists no poster for 2020 or 2021, moving directly from the 2019 work by Edurne Taínta Balda to the 2022 poster by Olaia Merino. The blank in the archive is itself part of the record.
In the world press2020, As the World Saw It
The cancellation was covered by international media as a marker of how severe the pandemic had become. These are the primary sources and coverage pieces.
NBC News, cancellation
Euronews, July 7 report
idealista, announcement
The Local (Spain), April 2020
Noticias de Navarra, 6 July
elDiario.es, economic cost
Key Dates in 2020
The sequence of events, kept on the record.
29 February 2020
Navarra's first COVID-19 case confirmed.
14 March 2020
Spain declares the estado de alarma.
21 April 2020
San Fermín 2020 officially cancelled by acting mayor Ana Elizalde. Mayor Enrique Maya is at home with COVID-19.
21 June 2020
The estado de alarma expires. The cancellation of the fiesta stands.
6 July 2020
The chupinazo hour passes in silence. The #LosViviremos banner goes up on the City Hall facade. The 400 people the Ayuntamiento allows into the Plaza Consistorial gather and wave red kerchiefs. No street celebrations, no chupinazo, no official events.
7 July 2020
The first encierro date. No bulls, no runners. A small group in white and red gathers at the assembly point and chants the prayer to San Fermín. Pamplona's streets are otherwise quiet.
14 July 2020
The last of the nine fiesta days. No Pobre de mí. No closing candles in the Plaza Consistorial. The encierro community looks forward, as the banner said, to living it again.
San Fermín 2020, Answered
Why was San Fermín 2020 cancelled?
The Fiesta de San Fermín was cancelled because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Gathering 1.45 million visitors in the narrow streets of Pamplona’s Old Town for a nine-day fiesta was impossible under those conditions. The cancellation was announced on 21 April 2020 by acting mayor Ana Elizalde.
Had San Fermín ever been cancelled before 2020?
The fiesta was not held in 1937 and 1938. In 1978 it was suspended partway through, after a fatal incident on July 8. In 1997 the corrida of 12 July and the encierro of 13 July were suspended after a local political figure was killed, so seven encierros ran that year. The 2020 suspension was therefore the first year since 1938 that the fiesta was not held at all, and the first year with no encierros at all since 1938.
Did anything happen in Pamplona during the fiesta dates in 2020?
Yes, but on a very reduced scale. The 400 people the Ayuntamiento allowed into the Plaza Consistorial gathered there at noon on July 6, the moment the chupinazo would normally fire. They waved red kerchiefs. The city put up a banner reading #LosViviremos ("We will live them"). On July 7, a small group in white and red gathered at the encierro assembly point and chanted the traditional prayer to San Fermín on otherwise empty streets.
Was a poster made for San Fermín 2020?
No official poster was selected. The Pamplona city council's annual public vote for the fiesta poster was not held in 2020 or 2021. The official pamplona.es archive of carteles shows no entry for 2020 or 2021, moving directly from the 2019 poster by Edurne Taínta Balda to the 2022 poster by Olaia Merino.
When did San Fermín return after the 2020 cancellation?
The fiesta was also cancelled in 2021, the first time since 1937 and 1938 that it was not held two years in a row. San Fermín returned in full in 2022, with eight encierros running from July 7 to 14. The poster that year was by Olaia Merino. The encierro community that had been waiting for two years ran again on the morning of July 7, 2022.
Which ganaderías ran when the encierros returned?
No encierros ran in 2020. When the fiesta returned in 2022, the eight ranches were Núñez del Cuvillo, Fuente Ymbro, José Escolar, La Palmosilla, Cebada Gago, Jandilla, Victoriano del Río and Miura.
The Fiesta Came Back
After two cancelled years, the running of the bulls returned to the streets of Pamplona in 2022. See how it came back, or plan your own run with the people who run it every year.
On the recordSources
Every fact on this page is checked against these sources. Where sources disagreed, the one closest to the day won.
- El País, "Los sanfermines se unen al dolor", 1997-07-13. elpais.com
- Noticias de Navarra, "La primera enferma por coronavirus en Navarra, grave, había viajado a Bélgica", 2020-02-29. noticiasdenavarra.com
- AFP via TerraDaily, "Spain overtakes China with 3,434 virus deaths", 2020-03-25. terradaily.com
- VOA News, "Spain Records 950 COVID-19 Deaths in One Day", 2020-04-02. voanews.com
- idealista, "Running of the bulls 2020: Pamplona San Fermin cancelled due to the coronavirus", 2020-04-21. idealista.com
- The Local Spain, "Running of the bulls: Pamplona San Fermin cancelled over coronavirus", 2020-04-21. thelocal.es
- elDiario.es, "150 millones de euros: el coste para Pamplona de suspender los Sanfermines", 2020-04-21. eldiario.es
- La Moncloa (Gobierno de España), "Consejo de Ministros extraordinario (sexta prórroga del estado de alarma)", 2020-06-05. lamoncloa.gob.es
- Ayuntamiento de Pamplona, "El 6 de julio se realizaran controles de aforo en los accesos a la Plaza Consistorial y a la Plaza del Castillo", 2020-06-26. pamplona.es
- NBC News, "Coronavirus forces cancellation of Pamplona bull-running festival for first time in decades", 2020-07. nbcnews.com
- Noticias de Navarra, "14 controles policiales el 6 de julio en el Casco Viejo", 2020-07-04. noticiasdenavarra.com
- Ayuntamiento de Pamplona, "Arranca con normalidad y sin incidentes este 6 de julio sin fiestas de San Fermin", 2020-07-06. pamplona.es
- Noticias de Navarra, "Los Viviremos, un gran panuelo rojo emplaza a los Sanfermines de 2021", 2020-07-06. noticiasdenavarra.com
- Noticias de Navarra, "Asi ha transcurrido la manana de San Fermin mas tristona que se recuerda", 2020-07-07. noticiasdenavarra.com
- Anales del Sistema Sanitario de Navarra (Castilla J. et al.), "Primera onda pandémica de COVID-19 en Navarra, febrero-junio 2020", 2022. ekoizpen-zientifikoa.ehu.eus
- El Debate, "Pamplona despierta los Sanfermines (suspensions history)", 2022-06-06. eldebate.com
- Ayuntamiento de Pamplona, "El Ayuntamiento de Pamplona edita un 'periódico' con información del encierro", 2022-07-01. pamplona.es
- Noticias de Navarra, "Resumen de los encierros de San Fermin 2022: los cebadita rompen el dicho de carrera rapida y limpia", 2022-07-16. noticiasdenavarra.com
- Rio Negro (EFE), "San Fermin: concluyen los encierros con un total de 35 heridos", 2023-07-14. rionegro.com.ar
- El Debate, "Ocho ganaderías pondrán a prueba a los corredores de San Fermín (Miura, Jandilla...)", 2026-07-08. eldebate.com
- Ayuntamiento de Pamplona, "Carteles de San Fermin (official poster archive)". pamplona.es