Grief and shock at Buenos Aires hotel where Liam Payne died: ‘I came to say goodbye’

The street of the Casa Sur hotel in Buenos Aires, where the One Direction star Liam Payne fell to his death , was quiet on Thursday morning. The curtains were mostly drawn, with an occasional guest peering down at the reporters below. On the tree outside, posters of a younger Payne were taped along with messages of gratitude and sorrow; underneath, candle wax melted on to the pavement.

“Liam. I’m missing half of me. Thank you for all of the sunshine, your smile, blazing every day,” read one message. “Thank you for all the music. You will always be in my heart,” read another.

Magalí Dalmau, 25, arrived early to say her goodbyes. “I am in shock, I can’t believe it. I have been awake crying all night, listening to their saddest songs, Moments , Spaces ,” she said. “I had to delete social media because I could not read the news any longer. Today I came to say goodbye.”

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Hotel guests say they heard banging and shouting for hours before Payne fell to his death on Wednesday.

Doug Jones, from Texas, was staying in the room opposite Payne’s. He spent Wednesday working at his desk, wondering about the noise from outside.

“I thought they were doing construction, there was so much banging, doors slamming, most of the day. It was loud, bizarre,” said Doug Jones. “Later I heard the sirens, thinking perhaps there was a fire somewhere. And then I heard a very loud scream.”

Payne, 31, fell to his death from a third-floor balcony into an internal courtyard. Police pronounced Payne dead at scene, saying he had suffered a “very serious injury” to the base of the skull. “There was no possibility of resuscitation,” said Alberto Crescenti, head of Buenos Aires emergency services.

On Wednesday evening, fans had gathered outside as forensic science investigators and dozens of police arrived at the scene. The supporters stood, for most of the evening, in silence until the body was removed in a fire truck. At this point, they began to clap, with some crying out in distress.

Jael Catalá, 21, lives in an apartment opposite the hotel. She watched the scene unfold from her balcony. “His fans stayed outside all night, past midnight, singing for him, lighting candles. I’m not a fan personally, but it was very emotional,” she said. “They felt so much.”

Related: After One Direction, Liam Payne was just getting started. His death is a heartbreaking end | Alexis Petridis

“It’s really, really shocking. We never expected this. We were so happy he was here in Argentina,” said Lucía López, 23, who left her work early to visit the scene and lay flowers. “I’ve had this poster of Liam since 2012, it used to be on my wall when I was a girl, now I am bringing it here.”

Berenice Desmond, 23, a member of the Argentina One Direction fanclub, said that supporters plan to continue arriving throughout the day. “They will continue building the altar with flowers, candles and letters,” she said.

Payne had been visiting Argentina to support Niall Horan, his former bandmate from One Direction. He was seen at Horan’s concert on 2 October at the Movistar Arena dancing and singing along with the crowd.

Hotel staff at the Casa Sur, in the cosmopolitan neighbourhood of Palermo Hollywood, made two calls to emergency services in the moments before Payne died.

In one of the calls, the transcript of which has been released, the receptionist said they had a guest who had taken “too many drugs and alcohol” and warned that the guest’s life “may be in danger” as the room had a balcony.

Payne reportedly fell from the balcony after the officers arrived.

Photos purporting to show Payne’s room in disarray were published in local news, believed to have been taken by hotel employees , sparking a backlash over journalistic ethics.

Born in Wolverhampton, England in 1993, Payne was just 16 when he became part of One Direction, a boyband formed on the British reality show The X Factor in 2010, along with Horan, Harry Styles, Louis Tomlinson and Zayn Malik. It became one of the biggest boybands of all time, selling more than 70m records worldwide, before going on an indefinite hiatus in 2016.

Payne had previously opened up about struggles with his mental health, saying that during the height of the band’s fame he began using alcohol and an epilepsy drug as a mood stabiliser to counter the “erratic highs and lows” he was experiencing.

Payne’s family issued a statement on Thursday, saying: “We are heartbroken. Liam will forever live in our hearts and we’ll remember him for his kind, funny and brave soul.”