VANCOUVER (AP) — A automotive struck revelers at a avenue competition in Canada, killing and injuring an unknown variety of folks on the occasion celebrating Filipino tradition, police stated.
The car entered the road the place folks had been attending the Lapu Lapu Day competition at 8:14 p.m. Saturday, the Vancouver Police Division stated in a social media publish.
“Quite a lot of folks have been killed and a number of others are injured after a driver drove right into a crowd,” police stated. The precise variety of casualties was not instantly obtainable.
A 30-year-old Vancouver man was arrested on the scene and the division’s Main Crime Part is overseeing the investigation, police stated.
“Presently, we’re assured that this incident was not an act of terrorism,” the police division posted early Sunday.
The competition was being held in a South Vancouver neighborhood. Video posted on social media confirmed victims and particles strewn throughout an extended stretch of highway, with at the least seven folks mendacity motionless on the bottom. A black SUV with a crumpled entrance part might be seen in nonetheless images from the scene.
James Cruzat, a Vancouver enterprise proprietor, was on the occasion and heard a automotive rev its engine after which “a loud noise, like a loud bang” that he initially thought could be a gunshot.
“We noticed folks on the highway crying, others had been like working, shouting, and even screaming, asking for assist. So we tried to go there simply to examine what was actually really taking place till we discovered some our bodies on the bottom. Others had been lifeless, others like, you recognize, injured,” Cruzat stated.
“It was horrible to see that form of incident, that scenario. It was heartbreaking,” Cruzat stated. “I couldn’t even think about that it’s really taking place in actual life, as a result of usually we see that on TVs or films. However when you find yourself in that form of scenario, it was actually surprising. … You couldn’t do something however to wish for them.”
Vancouver Mayor Kenneth Sim stated in a social media publish that the town would supply extra data when doable.
“I’m shocked and deeply saddened by the horrific incident at immediately’s Lapu Lapu Day occasion,” Sim stated. “Our ideas are with all these affected and with Vancouver’s Filipino group throughout this extremely troublesome time.”
Vancouver had greater than 38,600 residents of Filipino heritage in 2021, representing 5.9% of the town’s whole inhabitants, in line with Statistics Canada, the company that conducts the nationwide census.
Lapu Lapu Day celebrates Datu Lapu-Lapu, an Indigenous chieftain who stood as much as Spanish explorers who got here to the Philippines within the sixteenth century. The organizers of the Vancouver occasion stated he “represents the soul of native resistance, a robust drive that helped form the Filipino id within the face of colonization.”
Prime Minister Mark Carney and different Canadian political figures posted messages expressing shock on the violence, condolences for victims and help for the group celebrating its heritage on the competition.
“I supply my deepest condolences to the family members of these killed and injured, to the Filipino Canadian group, and to everybody in Vancouver. We’re all mourning with you,” Carney wrote.
“As we wait to be taught extra, our ideas are with the victims and their households — and Vancouver’s Filipino group, who had been coming collectively immediately to have a good time resilience,” wrote Jagmeet Singh, chief of the New Democratic Get together, who was on the competition earlier within the day.
“My ideas are with the Filipino group and all of the victims focused by this mindless assault. Thanks to the primary responders who’re on the scene as we wait to listen to extra,” Conservative Get together chief Pierre Poilievre wrote.
David Eby, the premier of British Columbia, the province the place Vancouver is positioned, stated he was shocked and heartbroken. “We’re in touch with the Metropolis of Vancouver and can present any help wanted,” Eby wrote.
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