Zhuhai hit and run driver, Fan, 62, upset with divorce settlement kills 35 in China, injures further 43 after targeting pedestrians and sports enthusiasts outside sports center.
A man upset with a divorce settlement is alleged to have killed 35 and injured a further 43 pedestrians in a ‘hit and run’ incident in a crowded street in China’s southern city of Zhuhai.
The incident happened at 7:48 p.m. on Monday, when a small off-road vehicle collided into a large group of people exercising outside the Zhuhai sports centre in Guangdong.
‘A passenger car hit a number of pedestrians at the sports centre in Xiangzhou District of Zhuhai City and drove away,’ Zhuhai police said in a statement, Reuters reported.
35 people have been killed and another 43 injured after a motorist unhappy over a divorce property settlement deliberately drove a car into people exercising at a sports centre in the #Chinese city of Zhuhai, police said. pic.twitter.com/iXiTSZ05Iy
— MDWLive! News (@MDWLiveFeed) November 12, 2024
Driver intentionally targeted victims
Police said the suspect, a 62-year-old man surnamed Fan, was being treated at a hospital after hurting himself with a knife in his car.
Many elderly people as well as teenagers and children were injured in the ramming attack, the Zhuhai Public Security Bureau said in a statement, calling the incident ‘serious and vicious.’
A video of the scene (see below, discretion advised) following the hit and run showed at least 20 people lying on the ground. Cries of ‘terrorist’ could be heard as ambulances arrived to take the injured to hospital.
Hundreds of rescue personnel from Zhuhai city and Guangdong province were deployed to provide emergency treatment, and more than 300 healthcare workers from five hospitals worked around the clock to save lives, state media Xinhua News reported.
Fan was apprehended by police at the scene after attempting to flee, police said, adding that he had self-harmed himself using a knife, causing severe neck injuries. The suspect is now in a coma as a result of self inflicted wounds.
Fan is said to have carried out the attack after becoming enraged following the outcome of a property settlement following his divorce.
Latest attack on strangers in China
Witnesses told local media that the injured were made up of ‘a group of middle-aged and elderly people who were exercising on the track’, which was later surrounded by investigating cops.
A witness going by the name of Mr Chen, who had been part of a walking group gathered outside the stadium told Chinese news magazine Caixin that a car suddenly charged towards his group at a high speed, ‘knocking down many people’.
‘It drove in a loop, and people were hurt in all areas of the running track – east, south, west, and north,’ a second witness told Caixin.
On the evening of November 11th, in Zhuhai, Guangdong, at the Zhuhai Sports Center, there was an incident where a car struck pedestrians. Injured people could be seen lying on the ground throughout the area, presenting a shocking scene. #珠海体育中心 pic.twitter.com/oPIywCji0Q
— 铁锁夢 (@ChainedSoul22) November 12, 2024
The 43 people injured in the incident are now in non life-threatening situation, police said.
President Xi Jinping according to state media has demanded severe punishment for the perpetrator.
By Tuesday morning, searches for the incident on Chinese social media were heavily censored on Chinese social media platforms as the annual Zhuhai Airshow opened Tuesday.
The tragedy comes just a day before the city was set to host a major airshow that features China’s new J-35 stealth fighter.
China has seen a number of attacks in which suspects appear to target members of the public at random.
In October, a man was detained after he allegedly attacked children with a knife at a school in Beijing. Five people were wounded. In September, three people were killed in a knife attack in a Shanghai supermarket, and another 15 were injured. Police said at the time that the suspect had personal financial disputes and came to Shanghai to ‘vent his anger.’
In May, two people were killed and 21 injured in a knife attack in a hospital in Yunnan province.
