The Associated Press reports that a truck loaded with weapons and hand grenades drove onto a sidewalk for more than a mile, plowing through Bastille Day revelers who’d gathered to watch fireworks in the French resort city of Nice late Thursday. At least 80 people were killed before police killed the driver, authorities said.
Nice prosecutor Jean-Michel Pretre described a horrific scene, with bodies strewn along the roadway, and Sylvie Toffin, a press officer with the local prefecture, said the truck ran over people on a “long trip” down the sidewalk near Nice’s Palais de la Mediterranee, a building that fronts the beach.
Wassim Bouhlel, a Nice native who spoke to the AP nearby, said that he saw a truck drive into the crowd. “There was carnage on the road,” he said. “Bodies everywhere.” He said the driver emerged with a gun and started shooting.
At least 85 people were killed, including children, and 18 were in critical condition, and the Paris prosecutor’s office announced an investigation for “murder, attempted murder in an organized group linked to a terrorist enterprise.”
Two Americans were killed, including a boy named Brodie who can be seen in a photo below tweets from Guns N’ Roses guitarist Slash and Rage Against The Machine guitarist Tom Morello.
Nothing I can say can express my feelings of sadness for the victims in Nice. It's almost uncomprehesible the evil that has occurred there.
— Slash (@Slash) July 15, 2016
Solidarity with the people of Nice, France.
— Tom Morello (@tmorello) July 15, 2016
