How furry convention descended into orgy of sex, violence and destruction as diaper clad adults dressed as cuddly animals trashed host hotel

RainFurrest 2015 was one for the books. The convention, filled with full-grown adults dressed as bears, wearing diapers and taking drugs, catapulted the often sex-crazed subculture cast into the public eye.

It was meant to be an annual convention designed for and by furries. But the debauchery that ensued left animal loving organizers banned from ever holding another event in the city of Seattle after brass at the hotel they defiled spread word about what happened the social gathering. 

Permanently plastered in the annals of internet history, the event started to go off the rails when someone purposely loosened a bolt on one of the Hilton Seattle Airport & Conference Center's toilets, causing it to flood instantly. 

The floor was soon filled with two inches of putrid toilet water - the first sign hosts had overestimated the wholesomeness of their guests, and were losing control.

Things only worsened from there - as attendees indulged in drink and drugs that eventually gave way to destruction. A series of arrest ensued, as attendees donned diapers and even went as far to defecate in a pool. A hot tub was also flooded, when a person shoved towels into the pump filling it with water. The hotel was left in ruins.

After receiving a bill for more than $100,000 in damages, organizers would eventually issue a cryptic statement as to why the event was called off permanently.

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'So what did happen - who's curious?' asked event organizer Trapa in March 2016, after Rainfurrest 2016 - and all the events that would have followed - were suddenly cancelled.

'OK, so let's start with why was the rainforest board so quiet,' the man who identifies as an African Civet went on, speaking to a Canadian crowd in Vancouver.

'The rainforest board was quiet because we got a letter from the hotel.

The hotel said, "you guys are going to send us a letter telling us you're canceling your event, and if you don't, we're gonna pretend like you did and charge you a cancellation fee."'  

'It was like $100,000 or something like that,' he recalled. '[I] don't remember the exact amount. $116,000.

'And then they said, “and then we're going to sue you for that amount of money.”

'So they wanted us out - and why do they want us out?' he asked fellow furries.

 'Well, we'll get into that.'

Dressed in normal get-up, the mind behind other furry festivals like Califur, RainFurrest, VancouFur, and FurEh proceeded to explain just what had gone wrong a few months earlier.

'So the first thing that was discussed was do we sign the letter or do we get a lawyer,' he said - recalling how he and other organizers arrived at a quick decision. 

'If we fought and we won, where would we be? At a hotel that didn't damn well want us,' he said of the board's decision.

'So we decided to say no, but unfortunately at that moment, when we had a split in the board, where half the board said, "Well then we need to tell everybody right now," and the other half said, "We should wait we should get a new venue - there's no reason to panic people"'. 

'So, the news could have been, rather than canceled - we don't know,' he added.

Citing some alleged back and forth between him and hotel brass, the member of the now-defunct Rainfurrest board said he and others soon came to the conclusion that they would need to look elsewhere in Seattle, no longer welcome at the Hilton.

However, after an extensive search, they quickly discovered they were not welcome anywhere else in The Emerald City either - an occurrence that Trapa said he found odd.

'[We] couldn't find anything in the local area - it seemed strange. Almost as if, like, they were being talked to.'

And talked to, they had - every hotel in town suitable to accommodate such a large, boisterous crowd.

He went on to claim he and others signed a 'mutual non-disparagement' with the Hilton, supposedly forbidding them from speaking negatively about his costumed crowd.

'Technically, if anybody phones the Hilton... they should be unable to talk bad things about us, other than to say just the facts.'

He went on to reveal how he and other organizers were able to secure a spot at a hotel in not-so-nearby Spokane - more than four hours away.

However, they also bailed out last-minute, he said, just a month before.

Because of this, Trapa claimed the prospective costumed cons had been sabotaged, by the same people he claimed purposely sent his event off the rails.

As proof, he cited letters allegedly sent to hotels across Seattle and Spokane, in which he said an unnamed attendee described some of the scenes they saw at the gathering.

The letters allegedly described the four days of debauchery in-depth, warning hoteliers why they should not host the next Rainfurrest. It remains unclear if it was a hotel staffer who sent the correspondences, or a sabotage-minded attendee as he claimed.

Either way, those warnings would all be heeded - quickly making Rainfurrest not only a failed experiment, but a thing of the past.

The disturbing account, however, lives on, and as a case study, serves as a stark reminder of how venue vandalism can ruin a convention - especially anthropomorphic animal related ones.

It started with a talent contest - which was documented, and went off without a hitch.

However, as the night went on, things devolved - as alcohol flowed freely and the furries were left to their own devices.

A streak of vandalism ensued, along with some bad behavior - to say the least.

First, a guest deliberately loosened the bolt on one of the first-floor toilets so that when the next person flushed, water flooded everywhere, two and a half inches deep.

Photos from outside the hotel room show how water sept as far out as the hallway, staining the carpet with soiled toilet water.  

An emergency plumber was called to the scene, photos and posts to Twitter show, but for the most part, the damage was done.

The flooding had become so bad, water had leaked through the first floor and into the basement below, damaging the hotel's servers.

As this was happening, staff and security were threatening to throw people out, as they had become increasingly rowdy, with many under the influence of drugs.

Some disabled their hotel room's fire alarms to 'hotbox' their rooms, smoking marijuana feely with their windows closed.

The fire department was called amid the unrest. Meanwhile, one of the attendees took dozens of towels and tossed them into the pool.

The perpetrator then took things a step further by rolling up several of the towels and stuffing them directly into a pump powering a nearby hot tub, causing thousands of dollars in damage, and putting the heated pool off limits.

A tweet from the now-defunct festival's still-operational Twitter account recounts in real time: 'Due to vandalism the hot tub is close the rest of the con.

'Sorry for the inconvenience.'

But attendees were not finished - particularly with their antics surrounding the pool. Someone defecated inside it, causing it to also be closed down.

In the same bathroom that was flooded, there allegedly was a unsanctioned installation of a glory hole - a small hole in the wall usually found in men's restrooms or adult book or video shops meant for anonymous oral sex. 

This, however, wasn't fully confirmed - unlike the other occurrences later laid out above, and in a letter from the furry festival's frustrated chairman the next month.

Other confirmed conduct was the open use of nitrous oxide canisters - or whippits - which create feelings of euphoria when used as an inhalant.

More than 2,000 of the cannisters were seen just laying around rooms and hallways -  just the start of the venue's drug problem.

Psychedelic mushrooms were also used, to the point where two people had to be hospitalized after becoming to intoxicated.

An unnamed staffer for the festival then got arrested for sexual assault, cops confirmed, while an attendee was also cuffed for regular assault.

A second ambulance was also called that day, after some of the attendees drank to the point where they could not stand.

All happening on the event's third day, the incidents were capped by another cop call - this time to the hotel's parking lot.

There, two more attendees were arrested - one for drug possession and the other for dealing.

As this was all occurring, attendees - already dressed like animals - began donning diapers, some of which were not just for show.

Often called 'crinkling' - after the noise those wearing the disposable garment make when walking around - the phenomenon divided the more than 2,700 attendees.

'Kinda ruins the con vibe when AN ADULT walks past with a dump in their diaper in public,' an attendee wrote on September 26, 2015, as photos shared by others showing men with visibly full diapers proved him right. 

'Please Keep that sh*t literally in the room #RF2015.' 

As these diaper-wearing hooligans openly roamed the halls, others began hurling the items - some of them soiled - out onto the hotel gardens and inside its stairwells.

A few hours later, the diaper throwing phenomenon had worsened, with some being found on people's cars, full of excrement. 

'Some people at this con are so classy,' one attendee wrote at the time.

By the next day, the festival's last, the hotel was in tatters.

Within days, a letter was sent by the Hilton to event organizers, in which staffers laid out all the reasons - described above - why RainFurrest would no longer be welcome at the Airport Hilton.

In that explanation, brass wrote how the more than $100,000 in damages - not including damage done to guest rooms and amenities like elevators - were more than the cost of all other cons combined that year.

'The Hilton sustained more damage during RainFurrest than it did from every other event at the Hilton the entire rest of the year. 

'This doesn't even include damage to the guest rooms or other incidental wear and tear like the elevators. 

'This year's incidents include two plumber calls, a flooded bathroom that soaked the offices underneath, towels stuffed into a hot tub pump and multiple petty vandalisms and thefts. 

'A final damage report is still being compiled. We had to send three people to the hospital and call the police twice.'

That said, it seemingly wasn't just the damages that influenced the decision, as RainFurrest, which held nine other gatherings before, was insured for more than $150,000.

Well over the sum specified by staffers, the promised payment was not enough to sway Hilton brass - clearly put off the by the toxicity on display days before.

They instead told anthropomorphic organizers to go look elsewhere - taking us to the next stage of the bizarre saga.

The hotel went on to spread word of what had happened to other venues in the Seattle area, and within months, there was not a single hotel in the entire city that would host them.

'No other hotel this side of the state wanted to take us,' Trapa went on to recall months later. 'From Seattle to Bellingham.'

He went on to claim the party that had tipped off the hotels was the same as those who put diapers on the cars - in a purposeful attempt to upend future Rainfurrests.

Forced to look elsewhere, organizers eventually turned their attention to outside the city, but were still unsuccessful.

Finding no luck, they started to look even further, honing in on a venue in Spokane that said they would accept them.

However, by February 2016, staffers at that unspecified hotel had changed their mind, Trapa revealed at the event in Vancouver, with the 10th annual RainFurrest just weeks away and now without a home.

During that appearance, Trapa continued to claim that it was because the supposed diaper-wearing saboteur had sent out another supposed letter detailing the previous RainFurrest, causing Spokane to back out.

Rainfurrest 2016 was cancelled, though promises the convention would resurface the following year were made.

However, that was not the case - as word and photos of the disastrous assembly continued to spread.

A few months before, Rex Wolf, the chair of RainFurrest 2015, sent a scathing email to attendees chiding them for their behavior.  

In the September 2015 correspondence, he told the 2,704 animal lovers 'We need to talk,' before laying out his concerns about the festival's future.

'This isn’t going to be easy or pleasant, but it’s very important for the convention and for the community,' Wolf - pun perhaps intended - wrote at the time.

'We’re entering a critical phase in RainFurrest’s history,' he went on, claiming that the festival he started in 2007 was in danger of going the way of the dodo.

'This is our tenth year, a major milestone for any event, and while we’d love to say right here and now that we’re ready to bring the convention to you for another ten years, we need to talk about where we are right now.

'By every count, 2015 should have been our best RainFurrest ever,' he continued.

'We raised over ten thousand dollars for charity. We hosted eight book launches for members of the fandom. Our registration line never exceeded fifteen minutes during the entire convention. 

'We had so many panel suggestions that we couldn’t fill them all,' he added, days after the debauched event.

'We had another year of record attendance, bringing together 2,704 attendees to Seattle, almost all of whom who had a wonderful time and had no trouble following the rules.

'However, it’s that “almost” that concerns us,' he proclaimed. 

'We had to pull five badges this year. That’s more than we’ve ever had to pull in any other year of RF’s history, possibly more than every other year,' he said of revoking the pins that granted attendees their furry-partying privileges.

'We try everything we can to manage incidents without resorting to ejecting people,' he continued, 'but we were forced into our last-resort option five times this year, and that’s not counting the attendees evicted by the Hilton itself.

'This alone would be bad news for RainFurrest, but there’s even more,' he added, echoing some of the correspondence coming from the hotel that eventually spread.

'For the last few years, the Hilton sustained more damage during RainFurrest than it did from every other event at the Hilton the entire rest of the year.

This... include[s] two plumber calls, a flooded bathroom that soaked the offices underneath, towels stuffed into a hot tub pump, and multiple petty vandalisms and thefts. A final damage report is still being compiled.

'We had to send three people to the hospital and call the police twice,' he added. By the con's last day, he said 'the hotel was so exasperated that they were threatening to evict attendees for single noise complaints.'

He went on to concede how 'RainFurrest is a large event', and that 'a few incidents are inevitable.'

'Most of those are no big deal,' he said. 'The Hilton understands conventions and they’ve been willing to work with us. 

'Most of the above, however, were completely avoidable,' he went on to declare, adding: '[A]nd they’re beyond the scope of “a good time.”'

He continued: 'Right now, we’re in trouble. There’s no sugar coating it. Our ability to hold this event is in jeopardy. The Hilton is not happy with us. 

'We’re doing what we can to keep the worst from happening, but the convention is going to have to grow, and we’re going to need your help to do it.

'We can’t make these changes without you,' he urged at the time. 'We can’t be everywhere and we can’t see everything. We’re asking you, all of you, to step forward and help make RainFurrest a better convention. 

'We understand that the problems are coming from less than two-tenths of a percent of the attendees,' he claimed, 'but they impact everyone who attends, and that’s why we’re asking for your help. 

'If you see damage or vandalism, please tell a staffer and the hotel. 

'If you’re not sure if something’s out of the ordinary, please come ask us. 

'If you’re uncomfortable talking to us directly, you can contact us anonymously,' he said. 'Con staff and the hotel will listen to you, just as your fellow attendees should.'

He concluded: 'We know that people come to conventions to have a good time, and we want to facilitate that, but a few people’s fun has gotten way out of hand. 

'On behalf of everyone who comes to RainFurrest, we’re asking you to please help us raise the standards of the convention. Speak up and be a voice for better behavior. 

'If we don’t start taking better care of our hotel, we'll lose access to it, and then nobody gets to have fun at RainFurrest any more.'

Those words proved prophetic, with the festival now longer held. 

The last Rainfurrest began on September 24, 2015 and ran through September 28, 2015.

To this day, the 2015 event stands as the sixth-largest gathering of furries in history, along with a warning of what not to do at a host's venue.