An Australian woman was among 19 people killed when a stampede erupted at an electronic music festival in Germany. The 27-year-old woman from NSW was caught in a surge of people at an entrance tunnel at the Love Parade festival in Duisburg in western Germany.

The circumstances of the rusing stampede were still not clear even hours after the chaos, but it appeared that some or most of the 19 had been crushed to death. Witnesses described a desperate scene, as people piled up on each other or scrambled over others who had fallen in the crush.

"The young people came to celebrate and instead there are dead and injured," said Chancellor Angela Merkel. "I am horrified by the suffering and the pain."

Criticism quickly fell on city officials for allowing only one entrance to the grounds of a hugely popular event that drew hundreds of thousands of people.

The founder of the Love Parade, Matthias Roeingh, known by the name Dr Motte, blasted the planning for the event, saying "one single entrance through a tunnel lends itself to disaster. I am very sad."

Authorities believe the panic might have first been sparked outside the tunnel when some punters tried to jump over a barrier and fell. Police commissioner Juergen Kieskemper said that just before the stampede occurred, police closed off the area where the parade was being held because it was already overcrowded.