Shattering end to a Saturday

“We saw these blokes throwing glasses at the restaurant. Then we heard someone shout out ‘they’ve got knives’.”

FOR most Londoners, it had been a perfect Saturday night.

Just three days after the official start of summer, thousands of people were in the bars, pubs and restaurants around Borough Market and London Bridge.

But the revelry was brought to an abrupt end shortly after 10pm when a white van mounted the curb on the southern end of the bridge, ploughing down pedestrians before three killers jumped out and began stabbing anyone they could.

“This is for Allah,” the men shouted as they slashed at passers-by, a girl among them.

Nearby, people were drinking and eating oblivious of the horror they were about to witness.

Some were cheering as they watched Real Madrid beat Juventus in the UEFA Champions League final in venues like Borough’s Ship pub.

The historic region, which is in the shadow of Europe’s tallest skyscraper, The Shard, is a popular location for tourists and locals alike. But, then, it all changed. Adam President said he heard noises outside the Black and Blue restaurant and looked through the window of the restaurant where he had been having dinner with friends.

“There was a commotion outside. We thought there was a fight,” he told News Corp Australia.

“We saw these blokes throwing glasses at the restaurant. Then we heard someone shout out, ‘ They’ve got knives,’ ”

People were throwing chairs in the melee.

Then three men with long knives entered the restaurant and the chaos moved inside. People were screaming, some ran, some lay on the floor or on their seats.

And, then, to his horror, Mr President said he saw one of the men stab a man dressed in chef’s white clothes from behind.

“I saw him get stabbed. Blood was spurting out of his back,” he said.

“I thought s--- we’ve got to get out here.”

A second man was slashed with a knife and fell on to one of Mr President’s friends, Jag.

Standing in a bloodstained grey T-shirt, Jag said he fell to the floor and the injured man landed on him.

“I don’t know who he was,” he told News Corp Australia.

“He was on me. I’m on the floor. He was on me.”

Just minutes earlier, he had also thought the incident was a fight that had ballooned out of control but, when he saw police enter the restaurant and then run, he said he also knew to run.

A woman in the same restaurant, Wendy Clarke, said she was separated from her daughter Emma, who she said later phoned her in distress.

“My daughter said, ‘Mum, I thought we were going to die,’ ” the clearly upset woman said.

Ms Clarke said her daughter hid in the kitchen and heard people trying to treat someone who had been injured.

She heard a police officer say “just keep compression on”, she said.

Another man in the steakhouse, Paul Clarke, said he heard what he thought were gunshots outside before the men ran in.

The group all fled the restaurant and ran into a nearby pub, where bouncers locked the doors and told them to lie on the floor.

But the horror continued. In the pub, Mr President said he saw a man with knife wounds lying on the floor outside the toilet.

People were treating the man, who was conscious, he said.

Police were also filmed storming into the Katzenjammers bar in Borough Market, ordering patrons on to the floor.

“Get down! Get down!” an officer shouted.

Other eyewitnesses told similar stories of men with long knives attacking people on the street after they exited a white van that mowed down up to 20 pedestrians near London Bridge.

Gerard Vowls, who had been in the Ship pub in Borough, said he saw a girl stabbed by three men near the south end of the bridge.

“I want to know if this girl is still alive,” he told The Guardian. “I’ve been walking around for an hour and a half crying my eyes out. I don’t know what to do.”

Police closed roads and set up roadblocks. Many explosions, believed to be controlled detonations, could be heard from within the closed-off area in the early hours of the morning.