Three people have been killed and several others injured following a shooting at a food festival near the Space Needle in Seattle on Sunday.
Police said there were two suspects who were shooting at each other. One of the suspects is in custody and the other still at large, although officials have said there is no threat to public.
Shots rang out at around 18:00 local time (01:00 GMT) at one of the city’s most popular tourist spots and as the annual Bite of Seattle food festival drew even more people to the downtown area.
Two deaths were confirmed at the scene, and one person died later in hospital. Those injured include a two-year-old boy, officials said.
Sunday was the final day of the annual three day free food festival held near the city’s iconic Space Needle which is located in the civic complex. The event draws some 350,000 people each year.
Videos shared online showed people crouched on the ground, taking cover behind pillars and shelves of merchandise in the Space Needle’s lobby during the shooting.
Several witnesses told a local TV station affiliated to CBS News, the BBC’s US partner, that they heard multiple shots before running away.
“At first, thought there were fireworks, and then everybody flooded and ran past us,” Nick Bate told the TV station.
Leanne Coles another witness told the station she used the Space Needle to try to keep track of where she was.
“Everybody started running, and so we just ran too, and we ran through the garden and we ducked and we decided to keep running with the crowd,” she said.
Faith Adia Hunter told Associated Press that one of the shooters was near her and her friends when they heard the shots, sending them fleeing for shelter in the Seattle Children’s Museum.
“We were right next to him when it started so we took off running,” she said. “So we took off running too into the building with the crowd.”
The Seattle Police Department said an investigation remains ongoing and urged the public to avoid the area.
Mayor Katie Wilson said in a statement that she wanted to “thank the Seattle police officers who responded to the scene and took a suspect into custody”.
She had originally announced two suspects had been taken into custody before updating her statement later on Sunday evening.
Police are questioning the “young person” they took into custody, Assistant Seattle Police Chief Tyrone Davis said, noting that two guns were recovered at the scene.
Four of the injured were taken to hospital in a stable condition, while a fifth chose not to, the fire department said.
The three people who died were a 19-year-old man, a 44-year-old man, and a 56-year-old woman, police said in a statement on Monday.
Credit: bbc
