:quality(80)/cdn-kiosk-api.telegraaf.nl/aa55b1dc-4b5b-11ec-b7f4-02c309bc01c1.jpg?fit=%2C&ssl=1 "Car crashes into Christmas parade in US: five dead and more than forty injured | Abroad")
The incident happened around 4:39 p.m. local time. It is not yet clear whether it is a terrorist act, according to the police. The suspected driver of the car has been arrested and is in custody. The investigation into the cause of the incident is still in a start-up phase.
The vehicle drove through a roadblock and would have driven into the parade at high speed. “The SUV came at full speed,” said a 39-year-old witness who watched the parade with her family from the sidewalk. “Then I heard people screaming.” The woman and her 3-year-old daughter sought refuge in a restaurant while her husband tried to help the injured.
A video posted to social media shows a red SUV driving into the parade from behind. In a second video, the police appear to open fire on the same car as it breaks through the roadblock. A police spokesman confirmed that an officer shot at the car. No bystanders were reported to have been injured. According to the police, no shots were fired from the car itself.
Panic
Panic broke out during the incident, according to American media. People were shouting the names of relatives. Video footage shows a woman screaming “my god” after a group of dancing girls in Santa hats are hit by the car.
:quality(50)/cdn-kiosk-api.telegraaf.nl/df505d40-4b58-11ec-b47f-0217670beecd.jpg)
—
View the first images of the attack with the SUV on the Christmas procession here. Text continues below the video.
Children, seniors and priest injured
Eyewitnesses spoke of dozens of people lying on the ground. Emergency services arrived en masse.
“There were pompoms, shoes, and hot chocolate everywhere,” Corey Montiho, a board member at a nearby Waukesha school, told the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel. I had to go through one body to another to find my daughter. My wife and two daughters were nearly hit. “My family is safe, but many are not. I held a little girl’s head in my hand, she had a seizure and she was bleeding from her ears. I held her mother as she collapsed. Please pray for everyone. Please pray.”
Several schoolchildren are said to have been injured, Fox News reports. And according to the Archdiocese of Milwaukee, one of those injured is a Catholic priest, as well as “Catholic schoolchildren from Waukesha” and “several parishioners.”
According to an eyewitness, the driver drove an SUV over a number of elderly women who were part of the group The Dancing Grannies and who took part in the annual parade in the city. According to other witnesses, at least four women from this group were hit by the car, New York Post reports.
The White House
The White House said President Joe Biden had been briefed on the events in Waukesha. “The White House is closely monitoring the situation. We sympathize with everyone affected by this terrible incident,” said a government official. He also said that the local authorities have been offered help.
–
