How truck driver drove into a crowd celebrating Bastille Day and killed 84 people
WARNING GRAPHIC CONTENT: The truck driver was shooting from the window of the cab as he smashed through the throngs of people – many still in beachwear – at 40mph.
KEY HIGHLIGHTS
- Vehicle speeds for 2km through busy crowd
- 84 people killed, including children
- Counter-terrorist investigators leading the probe
- Driver ‘was 31-year-old man from Nice of Tunisian origin’
- Hollande extends French state of emergency
- Everything we know so far on Friday morning
- Donald Trump: ‘It’s only getting worse’
By ABDULHAKIM SHERMAN
newsdesk@dailyreporter.co.ke
A terrorist gunman killed 84 people and wounded scores when he drove a heavy truck at high speed into a crowd watching Bastille Day fireworks in the French Riviera city of Nice late on Thursday.
According to The Telegraph, the driver was shot dead after barrelling the truck two kilometres (1.3 miles) through the festive crowd on the palm-lined Promenade des Anglais, sending hundreds fleeing in terror and leaving the area strewn with bodies.
Authorities said they found identity papers belonging to a 31-year-old French-Tunisian citizen in the truck, as well as “guns” and “larger weapons”.
In a pre-dawn address to the nation, President Francois Hollande called up military and police reservists to relieve forces worn out by an eight-month state of emergency begun after the Islamic State militant group killed 130 people in Paris. The state of emergency has been extended.
“France is filled with sadness by this new tragedy,” Hollande said, noting several children were among the dead in what he said he had no doubt was an act of terrorism.
Angela Merkel says Germany will stand by France in “fight against terrorism”
The German Chancellor has condemned the attack in Nice, saying Germany would stand by France’s side in the “fight against terrorism”. Speaking from the ASEM summit in Mongolia, she said:
All of us who have come together at the ASEM summit are united in our feeling of disbelief at the attack of mass murder in Nice.
Germany stands in the fight against terrorism at France’s side, united with many, many others. I am convinced that, despite all the difficulties, we shall win this fight.
Videos continue to emerge from eye-witnesses
Here you see the moment the white van ploughed into the crowd, as pedestrians fled the scene.
The gunman killed 84 people and wounded many others when he drove a heavy truck at high speed into the crowd watching the Bastille Day fireworks in Nice.
Gunman was known to police
The truck driver was known to French police for common law crimes such as theft and violence, according to police sources, but not to the intelligence services.
Update on gunman’s weapons
The truck driver who rammed his vehicle into a massive crowd in Nice fired a pistol several times before being shot dead by police, a local official said Friday.
“At the moment that he was shot dead by police, he had fired several times,” said president of the region Christian Estrosi.
A source close to the investigation said an “inactive” grenade was found inside the 19-tonne truck, as well as “several fake rifles”.
Regional lawmaker Eric Ciotti described “terrifying images, a scene of absolute horror, with many children among the dead”.
“Families who were sharing a moment of leisure were targeted. It was a symbolic day in a symbolic place. That… motivated the attack,” he said.
