Nice truck incident, Bastille day.

[Harbornite]

Reports are coming in that a truck has ploughed into a crowd of people celebrating Bastille day in Nice, France.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-36800730

A lorry has struck a crowd during Bastille Day celebrations in the southern French city of Nice, with reports of many dead.
The incident took place on the famous Promenade des Anglais during a firework display, media reports say.
One image on Twitter showed about a dozen people lying on the street, some being tended to.
The local prefecture has urged people in the area to remain indoors, calling the incident "an attack".
Nice Mayor Christian Estrosi said that "a lorry driver appears to have killed dozens of people".
A local official was later quoted as saying that at least 30 people were dead.

Footage shows multiple victims, some injured and some dead. This is awful news and my thoughts go out to all victims and families. May the dead rest in peace.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Reports are now coming in that the driver has been killed. I do feel sorry for France, the Euros had been relatively peaceful and now they have this to deal with.

 

[Harbornite]

60 people now dead apparently. Terrible.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-36800730

A lorry has struck a crowd during Bastille Day celebrations in the southern French city of Nice, killing about 60 people, officials are quoted as saying by local media.

 

[TRAX]

Now up to 73 dead.

 

[St Rollox]

Shocking
RIP
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Now 80 dead including children.
Horrific.

 

[Antman]

Death toll up to 80 now including many children, just awful.

The driver was eventually shot dead by police otherwise it would have been a lot worse.

 

[DarloRich]

BBC: The driver ploughed on for 2km on the Promenade des Anglais at about 23:00 local time, before being shot dead by police.

Terrible - absolutely awful. 2km!

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Reports of Tunisian/French personal documents of the lorry driver being discovered.

 

[TRAX]

At least 84 dead.

 

[Harbornite]

When I learnt of the death of the "Chechnyan" one of thr top ISIL generals serving in Iraq who was killed two days ago, I did wonder if they would seek revenge with a terrorist attack. However this obviously can't be confirmed and the attack might simply be a reponse to Bastille day.

 

[Phil.]

The religion of peace and love strikes again. Last night French diplomats booed the new foreign secretary when he mentioned that brexit will enable us to take control of our borders again. I wonder what those same diplomats are thinking now of their porous borders after this Tunisian has killed scores of French citizens.

 

[Arglwydd Golau]

The religion of peace and love strikes again. Last night French diplomats booed the new foreign secretary when he mentioned that brexit will enable us to take control of our borders again. I wonder what those same diplomats are thinking now of their porous borders after this Tunisian has killed scores of French citizens.

Wasn't he French?

 

[Phil.]

Tunisian,. He may have had French citizenship but he was Tunisian.

 

[TRAX]

Franco-Tunisian.

 

[GB]

Truly horrific. But why is France bearing the brunt of such attacks? Three or four high profile attacks in as many years?

 

[ainsworth74]

Truly horrific. But why is France bearing the brunt of such attacks? Three or four high profile attacks in as many years?

Demographics. They have a large Muslim population and, more importantly, one in which there is a lot of poverty. This makes it a fertile breeding ground for extremists to radicalise otherwise normal people (i.e. 'the evil West keeping us down and trampling on our religion whilst they keep everything for themselves, we must take action!' etc etc). A similar thing is occurring in Belgium.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Truly horrific. But why is France bearing the brunt of such attacks? Three or four high profile attacks in as many years?

Look at those countries along the coastline of North Africa and see how many of these at one time were part of the French colonial empire.

 

[Garmoran]

Last night French diplomats booed the new foreign secretary when he mentioned that brexit will enable us to take control of our borders again.

And there I was thinking that he was booed for having the hypocrisy to talk about pursuing an "ever closer union" with France...

 

[Bungle73]

The religion of peace and love strikes again.

As opposed to the religion of systemic child abuse.

Last night French diplomats booed the new foreign secretary when he mentioned that brexit will enable us to take control of our borders again. I wonder what those same diplomats are thinking now of their porous borders after this Tunisian has killed scores of French citizens.

Last time I checked we already had "control" of our borders.

 

[jon0844]

Our borders can keep the movement of weapons fairly well controlled, but now we have a lorry used as a very effective weapon.

One wishes we were really able to stop people sneaking over from Calais. Everyone knows a fair few make it every night.

Of course we have had homegrown terrorism, but I do fear for the prospects of letting more people in who, by being illegal, will live in far worse conditions.

 

[Butts]

Look at those countries along the coastline of North Africa and see how many of these at one time were part of the French colonial empire.

Unfortunately a lot of them seem to remember The Paris Massacre of 1961 during the Algerian War, when that well known Vichy collaborator Maurice Papon was head of the Paris Police who murdered a considerable number of protesters a lot of whom were thrown into the Seine.

 

[Harbornite]

As opposed to the religion of systemic child abuse.

Last time I checked we already had "control" of our borders.

The religion of peace and love strikes again.

Both religions are pretty crap to be honest. It would be inaccurate to accuse all 1.6 billion muslims of terrorism and those who do engage in terrorism have proven to be bad muslims. However, the killings are still committed in the name of Islam.

 

[edwin_m]

Tends to show there is no need for guns and bombs if all that is needed for that much death and destruction is a truck. This has obviously been anticipated in the UK by installing hardened bollards at major railway stations etc, though I'm sure there are softer targets available here too.

Another reason to hit at France may be the anti-immigrant National Front having significant support with elections approaching. It suits the terrorists to fan the flames of racial and religious hatred even though that disadvantages the communities they would claim to represent.

 

[Harbornite]

Tends to show there is no need for guns and bombs if all that is needed for that much death and destruction is a truck. This has obviously been anticipated in the UK by installing hardened bollards at major railway stations etc, though I'm sure there are softer targets available here too.

Another reason to hit at France may be the anti-immigrant National Front having significant support with elections approaching. It suits the terrorists to fan the flames of racial and religious hatred even though that disadvantages the communities they would claim to represent.

The best targets on the UK are probably shopping centres. Ideally, more armed police would be stationed in cities, especially during public gatherings such as those across France for Bastille day.

 

[ExRes]

Ideally, more armed police would be stationed in cities, especially during public gatherings such as those across France for Bastille day.

I wouldn't have thought that will go down very well on this forum, I seem to recall that there's been a totally anti view to arming any police in this country on a number of previous threads let alone having more, but then Government and Security departments will always be kicked whatever their decisions on protecting the population

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

ISIL were known to have encouraged individual like-minded Wahaabists living in Europe to carry out a personal attack by the use of knives, vehicles, etc.

That is the most worrying thing to my mind as many of these would not be known to the security services.

 

[Busaholic]

Would it make it better or worse if it proves to be the work of a deranged or evil individual acting totally alone? No group has claimed 'credit' for this, he appears to have acted entirely alone on the night and reports say he drank alcohol, took drugs and ate pork. If so, he's more akin to the Hungerford gunman, the Dunblane school massacre or the various people who've gone on the rampage on US campuses, except for the scale of it. A lorry driven without due care and attention can cause death and misery so one deliberately driven at high speed into a huge crowd would be bound to result in large casualty figures even without guns or grenades being added to the mix. What I'm saying is, it could happen anywhere anytime, it was just the unfortunate people in Nice who were on the receiving end this time.

 

[jon0844]

Tends to show there is no need for guns and bombs if all that is needed for that much death and destruction is a truck. This has obviously been anticipated in the UK by installing hardened bollards at major railway stations etc, though I'm sure there are softer targets available here too.

Well, any pedestrianised street (such as the recent event on Regent Street) may now require much better barriers to be installed.. but of course, you can't just stop it happening almost anywhere if we get more 'lone wolf' events.

As said, ISIS has been encouraging people to just get up and do something, so I do fear we may see many more attacks like this - and they'll be incredibly hard, if not impossible, to predict.

Also, when people are willing to die there's no need for them to plan an exit strategy.

 

[miami]

ISIL were known to have encouraged individual like-minded Wahaabists living in Europe to carry out a personal attack by the use of knives, vehicles, etc.

That is the most worrying thing to my mind as many of these would not be known to the security services.

Indeed, and a lone wolf armed with a deadly implement like a van hired for the day can cause a lot of deaths quite quickly. If you can get something like a pistol and take a trip to a shopping centre or school playground you can cause major amounts of terror, and there's very little anyone can do.

 

[Antman]

Well, any pedestrianised street (such as the recent event on Regent Street) may now require much better barriers to be installed.. but of course, you can't just stop it happening almost anywhere if we get more 'lone wolf' events.

As said, ISIS has been encouraging people to just get up and do something, so I do fear we may see many more attacks like this - and they'll be incredibly hard, if not impossible, to predict.

Also, when people are willing to die there's no need for them to plan an exit strategy.

I understand your point about Regent Street but there are any number of opportunities in and around Central London for anybody minded to do such a thing.

I work in the road haulage industry and we've discussed the possibility of something like this before. If somebody is determined enough there really is no way of stopping them.

 

[Rich McLean]

Eventually it will get to the stage where armed troops are patrolling the streets of high risk hot spots (i.e. Major events, large transport hubs, major shopping centre's etc) if such Terrorist attacks continue. I doubt arming the police will happen in the short term, but something has to be done