11 dead in Vancouver car ramming

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Eleven people are dead and dozens were injured after a driver plowed into a crowd at a festival in Vancouver, Canada, on Saturday night.

At a press conference Sunday, authorities warned that the death toll may rise in the coming days. The suspect, a 30-year-old Vancouver resident with a history of mental illness, was known to police. The individual has not yet been identified or formally charged. Officials confirmed the event is not an act of terrorism.

“It would appear that mental health appears to be the underlying issue here,” Vancouver Mayor Ken Sim said at a Sunday press conference.

Police described the group of victims as “mixed genders, male, female and young people.” They range in age from 5 to 65, Steve Rai, Vancouver’s interim police chief, said Sunday.

Rai added that there are dozens more injured, some critically. Some victims have still not been identified.

In graphic videos of the incident’s aftermath posted on social media and verified by NBC News, first responders and emergency vehicles on the scene were seen tending to victims as onlookers appeared distressed, crying and in shock.

What appeared to be the vehicle, a crumpled black SUV, was seen stopped in the middle of the street after crashing into food trucks that flanked both sides of a street that had been made into a pedestrian mall for what had been, just moments before, a joyous celebration of Filipino culture.

The ruins of damaged food trucks also appeared scattered across the area.

“Last night, as members of Vancouver’s Filipino community gathered for a celebration of community and culture in East Vancouver,” Rai said Sunday afternoon. “Their collective safety and security were stolen when a man in a vehicle drove through a festival.”

According to Vancouver police, the crowd, which had gathered for the annual Lapu-Lapu Day block party, captured the driver and turned him over to police.

said Vancouver police worked with the city to conduct a risk assessment before Saturday's festival and found “no known threats to the event or to the Filipino community.”

As a result, Rai said, they determined that “dedicated police officers and heavy vehicle barricades” weren’t necessary at the festival site. He also noted that the police department and the city will work to review “all of the circumstances surrounding the planning of this event.”

More than 100 Vancouver police officers are now working the case, Rai said.

The attack occurred on East 41st Avenue and Fraser Street shortly after 8:14 p.m. local time, the Vancouver Police Department said in a post on X.

Rai sidestepped questions on Sunday about a possible motive, except to say that “the person we have in custody does have a significant history of interactions with police and health care professionals related to mental health.”

He also said Sunday that police had not had any interactions with the suspect immediately leading up to Saturday night’s mass casualty event.

Yoseb Vardeh, the co-owner of a food truck that was stationed at the Lapu-Lapu Day festival, told the Vancouver Sun, a Canadian news outlet, that he heard an engine revving before a speeding truck drove straight down the middle of a pedestrian-only area.

“I got outside my food truck, I looked down the road and there’s just bodies everywhere,” Vardeh said.

He added that the police acted quickly to cordon off the area and arrest the man. “This is something that happens in the States, not here,” he said.

Victims were taken to nine different hospitals, Rai said Sunday.

Deana Lancaster, a spokesperson for Vancouver General Hospital, the region’s top trauma facility, said it had received multiple patients from the incident, which she understood to be the Lapu-Lapu Day party.

“I am shocked and deeply saddened by the horrific incident at today’s Lapu Lapu Day event,” Sim said earlier Sunday, adding that more information would be forthcoming as soon as it is available.

“Our thoughts are with all those affected and with Vancouver’s Filipino community during this incredibly difficult time,” Sim said.

British Columbia Premier David Eby said his team was in contact with Vancouver officials and would provide any needed support.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney offered condolences on X and said officials were monitoring the situation.

While addressing Canadians in a broadcast on Sunday morning, Carney described the tragic losses “as every family’s nightmare.” He went on to highlight the resilience and strength of the Filipino Canadian community.

Carney referenced a Tagalog term that he said “captures the Filipino spirit of community of cooperation and unity.”

“And it’s this spirit upon which we must draw in this incredibly difficult time,” Carney said. “We will comfort the grieving. We will care for each other. We will unite in common purpose.”

Jagmeet Singh, the leader of Canada’s New Democrat Party, said on X that he was “horrified.”

“As we wait to learn more, our thoughts are with the victims and their families — and Vancouver’s Filipino community, who were coming together today to celebrate resilience,” he said.

In 2023, the province of British Columbia officially declared April 27 to be Lapu-Lapu Day, commemorating a battle on the island of Mactan, in what is now the Philippines, on April 27, 1521. Lapu-Lapu was an Indigenous leader who is widely credited, and celebrated, in the Philippines for killing Ferdinand Magellan, the Portuguese explorer who landed in Mactan while helming a Spanish expedition to circumnavigate the globe.

There are nearly 1 million Filipino immigrants and people of Filipino descent in Canada, according to the 2021 census.

There will be a community gathering — where the mayor will meet with the city’s Filipino community— and a vigil Sunday night in Vancouver from 5-7 p.m. local time.