People with shovels descended on a protected sand dune after influencers said they'd buried $1,000 in a suitcase there

• Influencers sent dozens of followers in Gran Canaria, Spain, to dig up a protected sand dune.
• They said they hid 1,000 euros in the dune as part of a promotional stunt.

The organizers of a Canary Islands music festival have been fined after a promotional stunt saw dozens of people trying to find a suitcase with 1,000 euros, about $1,085, buried in a protected sand dune, according to local reports.

The event aimed to create buzz around the DN7 Festival, set to be held in March at a stadium in Maspalomas, a tourist resort on Gran Canaria, El País reported.

"We have been given €1,000 for the promotion of the event, and instead of burning it in TV commercials we are going to hide them around the island," a video for the event said, per the Times of London.

"The first person to find it gets to keep it," the organizers said.

Screenshots and videos showed dozens of people flooding onto the Maspalomas dunes, with the caption: "Let's go for the 1,000 euros."

The dunes are considered a special natural reserve with "incalculable ecological value," according to the official tourism website for the island.

That designation aims to slow human-caused erosion, which has seen an estimated 45,000 cubic meters of sand disappear into the sea each year, the tourism website said.

Visitors are only supposed to use designated routes to cross the dunes.

The island's environmental office posted to X on Sunday that it was opening an investigation.

It later said that it hadn't found any impact on the area's animal or plant life, and that the landscape itself has been restored, El País reported.

Even so, Gran Canaria said it was fining the festival roughly $650 for breaking the rules, according to the outlet.

DN7 Music Festival did not immediately respond to Business Insider's request for comment.