Several feared dead as truck crashes into New Orleans crowd: Report 

At least 10 people have been killed and 35 others injured after a driver crashed his vehicle into a crowd at high speed in the city of New Orleans in the early hours of New Year’s Day.

On Wednesday, officials in the United States city described the car-ramming as a deliberate attack.

“This man was trying to run over as many people as he could,” New Orleans Police Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick told reporters on Wednesday. “He was hellbent on creating the carnage and the damage that he did.”

The incident occurred around 3:15am (09:15 GMT) near the intersection of Canal and Bourbon streets, a busy pedestrian thoroughfare in the heart of New Orleans’s historic French Quarter.

The New Orleans Police Department explained in a statement that the car struck “multiple” pedestrians before crashing.

“After the vehicle came to a stop, the suspect reportedly opened fire on responding officers, who returned fire,” the police statement said. “The victim was struck and subsequently declared deceased on scene.”

Videos shared online and verified by Al Jazeera show people fleeing the scene of the incident after gunshots rang out.

Kirkpatrick said the driver shot two police officers, but they were in “stable” condition.

Questions of motive

The incident came as late-night New Year’s celebrations continued on Bourbon Street, a popular destination for party-goers in the city, packed with bars and venues for music and dancing.

It also happened hours before the kickoff of the Allstate Sugar Bowl, a college football quarterfinal held in the city’s Caesars Superdome, with thousands expected to be in attendance.

Investigators with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) later reported that they had discovered what appeared to be an improvised explosive in the suspect’s vehicle, though it was unclear at the time whether the device was viable.

New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell described the incident as a “terrorist attack”.

“We do know the city of New Orleans was impacted by a terrorist attack,” she said in a pre-dawn news conference. “It’s all still under investigation.”

The FBI also said in a statement, “We are working with our partners to investigate this as an act of terrorism.”

But initially, law enforcement appeared wary of designating the event as a terrorist attack. Alethea Duncan, an assistant special agent in charge of the FBI’s New Orleans field office, had said earlier in the day: “This is not a terrorist event.”

Public officials react

The White House said that President Joe Biden has been briefed on the situation and confirmed that the FBI is on the ground alongside local law enforcement.

His office also confirmed that Biden had been in touch with Mayor Cantrell in the hours since the fatal ramming.

Another member of the Biden administration, Attorney General Merrick Garland, called the car-ramming a “terrible tragedy”.

“My heart is broken for those who began their year by learning people they love were killed in this horrific attack,” Garland, the top law enforcement officer in the federal government, wrote in a statement.

He confirmed that federal authorities were treating the incident as an act of terrorism, and he pledged to “deploy every available resource to conduct this investigation”.

Meanwhile, Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry urged people to stay away from the site of the attack, as the investigation continues. Multiple blocks of Bourbon Street had been cordoned off after the car-ramming.

“A horrific act of violence took place on Bourbon Street earlier this morning,” Landry wrote on the social media platform X, adding that he was “praying for all the victims and first responders on the scene”.

New Orleans has seen shootings and cars colliding with crowds at past parades.

In November 2024, two people were killed and 10 others injured in two separate shootings along a New Orleans parade route attended by thousands, local media reported.

In February 2017, a pickup truck driven by a man who police said appeared to be highly intoxicated plowed into a crowd of spectators watching the main Mardi Gras parade in New Orleans, injuring more than 20 people.