A minimum of 9 individuals had been killed when a person drove right into a crowd at a Filipino heritage pageant within the Canadian metropolis of Vancouver, and an unknown quantity had been injured, police mentioned Sunday.
The car entered the road at 8:14 p.m. on Saturday and struck individuals attending the Lapu Lapu Day pageant, the Vancouver Police Division mentioned in a social media submit.
A number of different individuals had been injured however the actual variety of casualties was not instantly out there.
DON MACKINNON/AFP through Getty Photographs
“We’re assured that this incident was not an act of terrorism,” police say
A 30-year-old Vancouver man was arrested on the scene and the division’s Main Crime Part is overseeing the investigation, police mentioned.
“Presently, we’re assured that this incident was not an act of terrorism,” the police division posted early Sunday.
Interim Vancouver Police Chief Steve Rai informed a information convention that the person was arrested after initially being apprehended by bystanders.
Ufuk Celal Guzel/Anadolu through Getty Photographs 
Video circulating on social media exhibits a younger man in a black hoodie together with his again towards a sequence hyperlink fence, alongside a safety guard and surrounded by bystanders screaming and swearing at him.
“I am sorry,” the person says, holding his hand to his head.
Rai declined to touch upon the video however mentioned the particular person in custody was a “lone male” who was “recognized to police in sure circumstances.”
The pageant was being held in a South Vancouver neighborhood. Video posted on social media confirmed victims and particles strewn throughout an extended stretch of street, with no less than seven individuals mendacity motionless on the bottom. A black SUV with a crumpled entrance part may very well be seen in nonetheless pictures from the scene.
James Cruzat, a Vancouver enterprise proprietor, was on the occasion and heard a automobile rev its engine after which “a loud noise, like a loud bang” that he initially thought is perhaps a gunshot.
“We noticed individuals on the street crying, others had been like operating, shouting, and even screaming, asking for assist. So we tried to go there simply to verify what was actually truly occurring till we discovered some our bodies on the bottom. Others had been lifeless, others like, , injured,” Cruzat mentioned.
“It was horrible to see that sort of incident, that scenario. It was heartbreaking,” Cruzat mentioned. “I could not even think about that it is truly occurring in actual life, as a result of usually we see that on TVs or motion pictures. However if you end up in that sort of scenario, it was actually stunning. … You could not do something however to wish for them.”
Wealthy Lam/The Canadian Press through AP 
Vancouver Mayor Kenneth Sim mentioned in a social media submit that town would supply extra data when potential.
“I’m shocked and deeply saddened by the horrific incident at right now’s Lapu Lapu Day occasion,” Sim mentioned. “Our ideas are with all these affected and with Vancouver’s Filipino neighborhood throughout this extremely tough time.”
Lapu Lapu Day pageant
Vancouver had greater than 38,600 residents of Filipino heritage in 2021, representing 5.9% of town’s complete inhabitants, based on 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 mentioned he “represents the soul of native resistance, a strong drive that helped form the Filipino identification 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 assist for the neighborhood celebrating its heritage on the pageant.
“I provide my deepest condolences to the family members of these killed and injured, to the Filipino Canadian neighborhood, 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 neighborhood, who had been coming collectively right now to have a good time resilience,” wrote Jagmeet Singh, chief of the New Democratic Occasion, who was on the pageant earlier within the day.
“My ideas are with the Filipino neighborhood 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 Occasion chief Pierre Poilievre wrote.
David Eby, the premier of British Columbia, the province the place Vancouver is positioned, mentioned he was shocked and heartbroken. “We’re involved with the Metropolis of Vancouver and can present any assist wanted,” Eby wrote.
