8 cyclists mowed by Uber driver near Sept 11 attack site
5 Argentinian friends among dead
An Uzbek man shouting 'Allah-u-Akbar ' ploughed a pickup truck down a crowded bike path near the World Trade Centre, killing at least eight persons and injuring 11 others in an ISIS-inspired plot termed as the deadliest terrorist attack on the city since 9/11.
The 29-year-old suspect was shot in the stomach by a police officer before being arrested. The media named the Uzbek man as Sayfullo Saipov, an immigrant who came to the US in 2010. He was an employee of Uber and had done more than 1,400 trips for the applicationbased cab service. The company had done a check thorough on him.
Images of ISIS flags were found in his truck, as well as a handwritten note pledging his allegiance to the terrorist group. An official said that the note read in part 'ISIS lives forever.'
The attacker left nearly a half km crime scene -- a treelined bike path -- strewn with mangled bicycles and their parts. Six men were pronounced dead at the scene and two others on arrival at the hospital. The victims included five Argentinians and a Belgian citizen.
The five deceased Argentinians were part of a group of school friends who had travelled to New York to celebrate the 30th anniversary of their graduation. A sixth man in the group has survived but is hospitalized. On Tuesday the group had chosen to enjoy the pleasant, crisp fall afternoon by hiring bikes and were going down the leisurely bike path which runs alongside the Hudson River.
The suspect was shot in the abdomen and overpowered by the police; he is currently hospitalised and is expected to survive. The hero cop who shot the truck maniac happened to be in the right place at the right time, after responding to a report of a suicidal girl at nearby high school, half an hour before the carnage began.
Sayfullo, 29, allegedly drove 4,000 feet down the path ploughing through cyclists and pedestrians - only stopping his rampage when he smashed into a school bus.
US President Donald Trump denounced the attack, saying "we must not allow ISIS to return".
New York has been largely spared from terrorism since nearly 3,000 people were killed in the 9/11 attack. The most recent violence from terrorism there came in September 2016, when a man set off shrapnel-packed explosives in the Chelsea neighbourhood of Manhattan. Nobody was killed, but 30 people were injured. Trucks have become a common weapon for terrorists in recent years, with the ISIS encouraging its followers to use them in carrying out deadly attacks.
In July 2016, as thousands of people crammed into the streets of Nice, France, for a Bastille Day celebration, an assailant influenced by the Islamic State drove a 19-tonne cargo truck into a crowd, leaving 86 dead and 434 injured. In December, a man with ties to Islamic State drove a 27-tonne truck into a Christmas market in Berlin, killing 12 people and injuring 56 others. Three months later, a man drove his car into pedestrians on London’s Westminster Bridge, killing four and injuring dozens more, before jumping out and fatally stabbing a police officer and being shot dead by other officers.