Numerous Confirmed Dead After Car Hits Vancouver Crowd

By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News

VANCOUVER, CANADA (Worthy News) – At least 11 people have been killed and a suspect arrested after a vehicle hit a crowd at the Lapu-Lapu Day street festival in the Canadian city of Vancouver, authorities said Sunday.

More than 20 people were also injured at the celebrations, but police ruled out terrorism as a motive.

The incident happened shortly after 8 p.m. local time Saturday as members of the city’s Filipino community gathered for Lapu Lapu Day, commemorating a Filipino anti-colonial leader from the 16th century.

Footage posted online showed a black sport utility vehicle (SUV) with a damaged bonnet parked on a street littered with debris as first-aiders tended to people lying on the ground.

One witness told Canada’s CTV News he saw a vehicle driving erratically in the area of the festival just before the crowd was hit. The Vancouver Sun newspaper noted that thousands had been in the area when the incident happened.

“I didn’t get to see the driver; all I heard was an engine rev,” said Yoseb Vardeh, a food truck operator. “I got outside my food truck. I looked down the road, and there’s just bodies everywhere. He went through the whole block; he went straight down the middle.”

Following the bloodshed, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney praised “the strength and resilience” of the Filipino community highlighted by the term bayanihan, a tradition of helping out your neighbour in a spirit of civic mindedness.

‘COMFORT THE GRIEVING’

“We will comfort the grieving, we will care for each other, we will unite in common purpose, “ he pledged.

Carney added in his address: “Last night, families lost a sister, a brother, a mother, a father, a son, or a daughter. Those families are living every family’s nightmare. And to them and to the many others who were injured, to the Filipino Canadian community and to everyone in the broader lower mainland – Vancouver – I would like to offer my deepest condolences and my wishes for strength and compassion in this tragic time.”

The prime minister stressed, “I know that I join all Canadians in mourning with you. I know that Canadians are united with you.”

Separately, world leaders mourned the victims, including French President Emmanuel Macron, who said: “Following the tragedy in Vancouver, I extend our solidarity to Canadians and the Filipino community. Our thoughts are with the victims and their loved ones.”

Vancouver, a seaport on the Pacific Ocean on Canada’s West Coast, is considered one of Canada’s most diverse cities.

The city and surrounding area have a population of about 2.6 million, which grew with immigration from Asia and Europe joining indigenous people.

Yet the latest attack underscored concerns over multiple mass casualty incidents in recent years, including some that used vehicles as weapons.

MORE KILLINGS

Last year in March, some six people from Sri Lanka, including a mother and four young children, were knifed to death in the Canadian capital, Ottawa. A male student from Sri Lanka who was living with them was charged with the crime.

Earlier in September 2022, some 11 people were killed and 17 injured in stabbing attacks across 13 sites in Canada’s western province of Saskatchewan. Two male suspects, who were brothers, led police on a multi-day manhunt across the country before one was found dead.

Earlier in June 2021, a man killed four members of a Muslim family by running over them with his pickup truck in an attack police said later was a premeditated hate crime.

There was more bloodshed, including on April 2020 when a gunman, who at one point masqueraded as a police officer, killed at least 16 people in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia during a 12-hour rampage in the country’s worst modern-era mass shooting, officials said.

In July 2018, a man walked down a busy Toronto street, shooting randomly into restaurants. He killed two people and wounded 13 before turning his gun on himself. That same year, in April 2018, a man drove a rented van into a lunch-hour crowd in Toronto, killing 10 people and injuring 15 along a roughly mile-long (1.6-kilometer) stretch of sidewalk thronged with pedestrians.

Previously, in January 2017, a man opened fire during evening prayers at a mosque, killing six people and wounding five. Twelve others were treated for minor injuries. It came a year after, in January 2016, a student killed his two brothers at home before opening fire at a remote community high school, killing two more people and wounding seven others.

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