Dana White Explains UFC 216 Going On As Planned: ‘We won’t back down from cowards!’

Late Sunday night of last week, tragedy struck Las Vegas, Nev. That being said, today’s UFC 216 event is still going on inside the Las Vegas T-Mobile Arena as planned. Now UFC President Dana White has come forward to explain the reason why.

Thousands of country music fans flocked to the 91 Harvest Music Festival last weekend for the headlining act of Jason Aldean. Late Sunday night, a gunman opened fire upon the unsuspecting crowd for what has become the worst mass shooting in modern U.S. history.

Across the street from the music festival, the gunman fired upon the crowd from the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino. A reported 59 people were killed from the shooting, with another 515 having been injured from the attack. The gunman has since been identified as 64-year-old Stephen Paddock, who was found dead in his hotel room after the incident.

Just short of a week later, the UFC is set to host the highly anticipated UFC 216 event tonight in Las Vegas, Nev. But, many didn’t know if the evnt would go on as planned, following the recent shooting.

In a recent interview with ESPN, Dana White explained why the event will go on as planned.

Here is what Dana White had to say:

“What you don’t do is you don’t back down from cowards. This coward that went up into a room, hiding, killing women, children, and people there dancing, singing, and having fun… you’re a coward. You can’t bow down to this kind of stuff. You have to take it head on.”

UFC 216 is a pay-per-view event that will take place tonight, Oct. 7, inside the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nev. In the night’s main event, UFC lightweights Tony Ferguson and Kevin Lee will battle it out for the interim title.