Five people were killed and more than 40 were injured when a vehicle drove into a Christmas parade Sunday afternoon in Waukesha, Wisconsin, city officials said.
Witnesses described the horror of seeing people struck and lying on the ground after a red SUV drove through a series of barricades and barreled into the crowded parade route on Main Street around 4:39 p.m. local time.
A video obtained by CNN shows the moment the vehicle struck pedestrians. A red SUV was seen hitting a person in a marching band, then the vehicle continues forward, hitting and running over others in the band and crowd before driving away.
Angela O’Boyle, who lives in a fifth-floor apartment that overlooks the parade route, told CNN she was on the balcony watching when “the next thing I heard were screams, and turned my head and saw the car come and plow into the band that was just pass my balcony at that point.”
“It hit at least two people right away and rolled over them. And then continued down the road to People’s Park which is at the end of the block – and then kept going, it didn’t stop,” she continued.
Boyle said she heard screaming and people yelling out their children’s names, adding “it was not something that I wanted to see.”
Kaylee Staral, a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel intern who witnessed the incident, told CNN’s Pamela Brown “probably around 20 to 30 minutes into the parade, a red SUV came running down the middle of the street – there were a lot of screams – and we almost thought maybe it was Santa, but it was a red SUV and it hit a lot of people.”
Staral went on to say “there were multiple people on the ground.”
In her description into those injured, Staral said “right in front of me in the little spot where I was sitting, probably four people were down, so there were a lot of people that ran to go check on them. I believe that the four people in front of me were still breathing but they were down, they were not moving.”
Police Chief Daniel Thompson said officers are working with the Waukesha County Medical Examiner’s Office to identify victims.
Thompson says there is “a person of interest in custody,” but would not say whether it was the driver of the SUV nor if any arrests have been made.
“This is still a very fluid investigation,” the chief told reporters Sunday night.