Seven people were reported dead and at least eight injured in Hamburg after a shooting in a Jehovah’s Witness church just after 9pm on Thursday evening.

Hamburg police found 17 uninjured people in the building and warned that one or more perpetrators might still be at large. As the evening progressed, however, police said there were indications that the seventh dead person, found in an upper floor of the building, was the shooter.

Warning of a “major operation” police sealed off the Alsterdorf area, north of the city centre, and urged locals to stay at home and others to avoid the area.

“Find protection immediately in a building,” was the warning from police to locals in the district between Hamburg city centre and the city airport. “Only telephone in an emergency so that the phone network doesn’t collapse.” Police said they had no immediate indications of a motive for the attack. 

Hamburg’s governing mayor Peter Tschentscher said he was “shaken” by the news of the shooting and expressed his “deepest sympathies” to the families of the dead.

Source: The Irish Times

BDST: 1045 HRS, MAR 10, 2023

MN