New Year: Tragedy as 10 killed, 30 others injured in U.S

News Update

At least 10 people were killed and as many as 30 injured after a vehicle drove into a large crowd on Bourbon Street in New Orleans’ French Quarter early on Wednesday, according to the FBI and city leaders.

A truck crashed into the crowd at high speed and the driver then got out, firing a gun, New Orleans Police Department Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick said at an early morning news conference.

New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell told reporters that the driver was on a mission to kill as many people as possible. “He was hell bent on creating the carnage and the damage that he did . . . This man was trying to run over as many people as he possibly could. It was not a DUI situation,” Cantrell said. Two police officers were shot but are in stable condition.

New Orleans police had 300 officers in the area for New Year’s Eve duty when the assault happened, Cantrell said. The driver of the truck swerved around barricades on his way into the crowd, she said.

“Last night, we had over 300 officers out here, and because of the intentional mindset of this perpetrator who went around our barricades in order to conduct this,” the mayor said.

The FBI has taken over the investigation. Alethea Duncan, assistant special agent in charge of the FBI’s New Orleans office, said later in the press conference that the incident is not being considered a terrorist attack.

“This is not a terrorist event,” Duncan said, adding that “an improvised explosive device was found” and the FBI is working to determine whether “it’s a viable device or not.”

President Joe Biden has been briefed on the attack, according to the White House.