Several of those hurt have been critically injured. The area is now in lock-down and police have warned people to stay away. Victoria state police say they have arrested the driver of the vehicle after it "collided with a number of pedestrians" in the city centre.A second man has also been arrested.
Police say 14 people have been taken to hospital, a number of whom are in a critical condition. One young child who has a head injury is said to be in a serious condition, Sky News Australia has reported.Other people were treated at the scene for a range of different injuries. At the time of the crash, the area was packed with Christmas shoppers. Witnesses told Sky News the car ran through a red traffic light in a 25mph (40km) speed limit zone.
A witness told radio station 3AW that she heard screams and saw "people flying everywhere". "We could hear this noise, as we looked left, we saw this white car, it just mowed everybody down," she said. "We heard thump, thump, thump. People are running everywhere."
Another witness said "hundreds of people" were told to get off trams near the area following the crash. It is not known whether the incident is terror-related.
Reports differ as to the speed at which the car was travelling, with some describing it as not travelling at speed, while anothers say it was travelling at around 60mph.A witness told ABC TV, "There was no braking, there was no slowing down. Whether it was targeted or whether he had a heart attack, or was drunk, I don't know." The area has now been closed off to the public, and has been designated as a crime scene while investigations take place.
British High Commissioner to Australia Menna Rawlings tweeted: "Following with concern reports of incident in Melbourne. Thoughts are with all affected".
0 comments:
Post a Comment