Terrorist attack in Nice

[Hazir]

Seems there was an attack in Nice on the crowd celebrating Quatorze Juillet. A truck was driven in the crowd and shots were exchanged.

[Loki]

Wow, dozens dead. Didn't think a truck could kill that many.

I was waiting to see if there's evidence of terrorism. We've had a few incidents like this in the US (with much lower casualties), and it's always been either a crazy or a drunk.

[Echovirus]

73 confirmed dead so far.

[Hazir]

Pretty much certain this was a terrorist attack. He drove zigzagging over the Promenade des Anglais for about 2km killing people. Eye witnesses claim that he fired a gun once the truck came to a standstill.

[Hazir]

Unconfirmed reports of 2 other scenes in Nice where possible hostage situations may be happening.

[Echovirus]

And I just saw that guns and grenades were found in the truck. I'm so glad that he didn't get to use those grenades.

[Loki]

What's surprising about this is that French terrorists seem to actually be getting more competent (at least as far as killing civilians goes). Not a good sign.

[Flixy]

[Timbuk2]

what the fuck

[Hazir]

I wonder how Israel deals with these kinds of risks. Am I right security forces there use different shoot instructions? What's most incredible to me is that this man could go on a 2km rampage in a place where you would expect security to be relatively tight.

[RandBlade]

Absolutely awful

[Aimless]

Hard not to feel an increasing sense of despair

And I just saw that guns and grenades were found in the truck. I'm so glad that he didn't get to use those grenades.

Fortunately they appear to have been fake, at least according to the BBC.

[Hazir]

Wow, dozens dead. Didn't think a truck could kill that many.

I was waiting to see if there's evidence of terrorism. We've had a few incidents like this in the US (with much lower casualties), and it's always been either a crazy or a drunk.

I'm a bit surprised that you are surprised by the number of casualties a truck can cause. In 2009 there was an attempt at the life of our royal family with a Suzuki Swift, which is a small and light car, restulting in 8 fatalities and 10 non-fatal casualities. That incident never left my mind and it has always reminded me of the possibilities terrorists could have if they contemplated this type of attack.

[Khendraja'aro]

Wow, dozens dead. Didn't think a truck could kill that many.

The difference in inertia is skewed so far towards the truck it's pretty hard to not kill a person you're hitting (or running over). As Hazir pointed out, even a small car can already create terrible wounds. And a truck only makes it easier to keep going.

[RandBlade]

Especially when it's not an accident.

[Loki]

I realize trucks can easily mow down people. What usually happens is they get slowed down by the bodies of the people they mow down. And it's hard to keep control of the car in such a scenario, which means they usually crash into something. But this guy was apparently a professional truck driver, which explains his "skills".

[Enoch the Red]

What a horrific tragedy. There just aren't any words to describe the depths of evil that man is capable of.

[wiggin]

I wonder how Israel deals with these kinds of risks. Am I right security forces there use different shoot instructions? What's most incredible to me is that this man could go on a 2km rampage in a place where you would expect security to be relatively tight.

Israel doesn't have a good handle on how to deal with this, especially given that a huge percentage of truck and construction equipment drivers are either Palestinian or Arab Israeli. Obviously there have been many attacks of this sort in Israel in the last few years, though casualties tend to be fairly low. There are a number of reasons for this:

1. There are security forces nearly everywhere, either on duty or off, especially at major intersections/roads/public places/public transit. That means that when an attack starts there is an excellent chance it will be prevented or stopped from continuing in short order. Also, those civilians who are armed (not that many actually by US standards, but still a decent number) tend to be trained infantrymen even if they are no longer in the military. Gives them a much better chance of shooting a deranged driver.

2. In certain areas - especially flashpoints like specific roads in the West Bank and areas near East Jerusalem - soldiers and cops are now on the lookout for erratic driving behavior and are primed to respond. This has some problems - while it is unclear whether this has happened yet or not, overzealous vigilance may lead to interpreting erratic driving for another reason (say, failed brakes, or inebriation, or exhaustion) as a potential terrorist attack, with the potentially lethal response. I don't know if they have more lenient rules of engagement per se, but certainly the judgment of 'is this concerning' might be tipped more towards an assumption of violent intent, with the subsequent higher chance of halting an attack in its tracks.

3. Many roads in Israel near public places aren't really easy to navigate in a way that would kill lots of people - other than the occasional bus or train stop. Roads in Jerusalem are tiny and hard to navigate at high speed, and big groupings of pedestrians tend to be protected from traffic by barriers of some sort. So you might kill, say, half a dozen, but it would be challenging to kill a hundred.

Lastly, Israel doesn't really have that good of a handle on this, despite all of what I said above. Intelligence is largely useless for detecting this sort of thing, and if a sufficiently large vehicle is used, they are hard to stop - recall the bulldozer rampage in Jerusalem a while back which went on for some time before a cop and two civilians were able to climb into the cab and shoot the driver at point blank range (this was in 2008; incidentally a distant cousin of mine was murdered in the attack). Israel has been dealing with this sort of incident off and on for about a decade and they don't have a good response for it other than constant vigilance. The total number of dead in each attack has been mercifully small (typically less than 5, though often a few dozen are injured with varying levels of severity), but that's hardly encouraging.

[Hazir]

Still, if you look at the pictures of the beginning of the attack, you have to wonder why that truck was allowed to be where where it was when he stepped down.

[wiggin]

Still, if you look at the pictures of the beginning of the attack, you have to wonder why that truck was allowed to be where where it was when he stepped down.

Certainly passive defense measures (such as the aforementioned barriers) help to protect large groupings of pedestrians. It won't stop an attack, but it will keep casualties from getting too high. Temporary gatherings (such as those for Bastille Day) might be more challenging to secure.

[Hazir]

Certainly passive defense measures (such as the aforementioned barriers) help to protect large groupings of pedestrians. It won't stop an attack, but it will keep casualties from getting too high. Temporary gatherings (such as those for Bastille Day) might be more challenging to secure.

It seems strange they didn't have barriers, I'm pretty certain they need very little incentive to get those out overhere. Like you say, it can't stop an attack 100% but it can limit the effectiveness. And you also have to wonder why there wasn't security to either stop him at perimeter, or how he managed to go on a 2KM rampage. And yes, I know how difficult it can be to take aim at someone driving a truck going at that speed.

[Ominous Gamer]

It seems strange they didn't have barriers, I'm pretty certain they need very little incentive to get those out overhere. Like you say, it can't stop an attack 100% but it can limit the effectiveness. And you also have to wonder why there wasn't security to either stop him at perimeter, or how he managed to go on a 2KM rampage. And yes, I know how difficult it can be to take aim at someone driving a truck going at that speed.

He was stopped, then allowed through using an ice cream delivery excuse. An attack like this would have worked pretty much anywhere with the right social engineering. Youtube any parade and you will see miles of unprotected swarms of people lining up behind the fence/rope/barrier that separates the event performers from the thousands of people in the crowd. Even events with armed police aren't safe, as the police are generally stationed at that barrier, making them next to useless in confronting an attack thats happening in and to the crowd.

I could easily see something like this happening at Tampa's Gasparilla with casualties that would dwarf Nice.



Now picture taking a Penske truck into 7+ miles of that.

[earthJoker]

Nice attacker plotted for months and had accomplices – prosecutor

Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel, the man who drove a truck into a crowd on the promenade in Nice on Bastille Day, killing 84 people, plotted his attack for months and had accomplices, the Paris prosecutor has said.

François Molins said five suspects currently in custody were facing preliminary terrorism charges for their alleged roles in helping Bouhlel.

He said information from Bouhlel’s phone showed searches and photos that indicated that Bouhlel had been preparing for an attack since 2015.

The new details came as French government tried to reassure its citizens following the country’s third major attack in 18 months. On Thursday the senate was set to pass a bill extending the state of emergency, which gives police extra powers to carry out searches and place people under house arrest, for six months.

It is the fourth time the security measures have been extended since Islamic State attacked Paris in November last year, killing 130 people.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...ces-prosecutor

Quite a long preparation for someone supposed to be radicalised just recently

[Hazir]

Well he already had a history of being violent, so it's not impossible 'they' merely needed to build on what was there already. What I keep asking myself is; where did he get the €82k from that he sent to his family just before the attack?

[earthJoker]

The first reports about the background said he radicalized withing the last few months. That is simply impossible if he already started to make plans a year ago.

[Hazir]

The first reports said he was barely a muslim at all. So much for first reports then. But where did the money come from?

[Khendraja'aro]

So, now we can add Munich to the list, it seems.

[RandBlade]

Though sounds like this may be a white supremacist attack ...

[earthJoker]

Could be anything. From Breivik copycat to Islamic attack or even some completely different motive.

[RandBlade]

Islamists generally shout "Allahu Akhbar" at the start of their attacks not "Fucking Foreigners" as has been reported.