Australia: Car plows into people in Melbourne, 19 injured
A vehicle has mowed down pedestrians in Australia’s second-largest city of Melbourne, leaving over a dozen people injured, some of them seriously, official reports say.
The incident took place in downtown Melbourne at a busy intersection just before 5 pm local time (0600 GMT) on Thursday.
Media reports said up to 19 pedestrians were being treated for injuries, 12 of them in hospitals, including a pre-school aged child in serious condition with head injuries.
Police said they had arrested the driver of the car after it “collided with a number of pedestrians.”
Sky News Australia, citing witnesses at the scene, said a white Suzuki SUV with two men inside had driven into the crowd with no signs of making an effort to slow down and had later crashed into a cable car stop.
“We could hear this noise, as we looked left, we saw this white car, it just mowed everybody down,” a witness said. “People were flying everywhere. We heard thump, thump. People were running everywhere.”
Police officers and security guards present at the scene described the accident as a terrorist act but that has not been confirmed by the authorities, yet, and am investigation is underway.
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