The hotel's "chief receptionist" made the first of two calls at 5:01 p.m. about a guest on "drugs and alcohol" who was "trashing the entire room," according to a BBC transcription. The caller claimed that when the guest "is conscious he is trashing the entire room and we need you to send someone."
The hotel employee got disconnected and called 911 a second time, asking them to "send someone urgently" for fear that the guest's "life may be in danger" as he "is in a room with a balcony."
La Nación, a national newspaper in Argentina, said resources were dispatched at 5:04 p.m. and they quickly arrived. Reports about a "male fallen from the third floor" came in at 5:07 p.m. Payne was pronounced dead at the scene in the hotel's courtyard minutes later.