The carefree evening with family or friends at the Magdeburg Christmas market turned into a nightmare when an attacker launched his powerful vehicle at the visitors, who were terrified by the scene.unimaginable“, according to the testimony of witnesses.
A 32-year-old victim, Nadine, was arm in arm with her boyfriend Marco, 39, when the car hit the latter. “He was dragged and ripped away from me, it was terrible“, she said. “Nobody shouted, we didn't hear the car“, she told the Bild newspaper.
She said her companion had been injured in the leg and head and that she did not know to which hospital he had been taken, describing a “unbearable uncertainty“.
It was around 7 p.m., in the city on the banks of the Elbe, some 160 kilometers from Berlin, when a powerful black vehicle crossed the party grounds, slaloming through the aisles.over more than 400 meters“, according to the police.
“We saw the roof of the car and then it happened. Everyone was lying on the ground, children, men, injured, it's unimaginable“, a witness told the television channel Welt TV. “It's terrible, there was a dead body next to me all this time. I thought I was just going to the Christmas market and such a thing happens. The world is sick“, added his companion.
One of the two fatally injured victims was a young child. More than 60 people were injured. When news of the attack spread, a heavy silence fell in the aisles of the Magdeburg stadium where the city's football club was facing Fortuna Düsseldorf.
In tears
Images of visitors to the market, broadcast by local media, show people trying to help those lying on the ground between stalls adorned with Christmas decorations.
The lights of the party were quickly drowned out by the flashing lights and lights of emergency and police vehicles in an incessant coming and going to evacuate the injured. Large white tents were set up, welcoming the victims not far from the sheds planned to sell mulled wine and gingerbread for the last weekend of Advent.
Giant Christmas tree, rides, ice rinks, nothing was missing for the party to be successful and full, four days before Christmas, in the early hours of the school holidays. The city center square hosting the celebrations will be transformed into a place of meditation. The first bouquets of flowers were left by anonymous people, local media report.
A memorial service will be organized in the main church of this town of some 250,000 inhabitants, located on the territory of the former communist GDR. “I don't know what world we live in that someone would use such a peaceful event to spread terror“, confided one woman.
The mayor of Magdeburg, Simone Borris, burst into tears in front of the press: “I could never have imagined that the city would be affected by such an event“. “I hope that after the mourning phase, we will manage to find a collective life again, that we will not lose the joy of living, she added, that it will simply be possible to continue to enjoy life“.
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