HAMBURG — A man driving a van plowed into a crowd in the northern German city of Münster on Saturday afternoon, killing at least three people and injuring at least 20 before shooting himself, German officials said.
A senior German security official briefed on the ongoing investigation said initial indications are that the incident was not related to terrorism, but that investigators were still working to establish that with certainty.
The official said investigators believe the 48-year-old German man, to whom the van was registered, had recently tried to take his life.
Police also dispatched a bomb squad to the scene to check whether there were explosives in the van, the senior security official said.
The official spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the unfolding details of the case.
Six people were seriously injured by the van, which ran into a group of outdoor tables at a restaurant, North Rhine-Westphalia police spokesman Andreas Bode told reporters.
Münster hospitals said that they were asking for donations of blood. One victim had a broken arm and needed an operation, according to Michael Bührke, a spokesman for Clemenshospital and Raphaelsklinik, two local treatment centers. Two other heavily injured patients were in an intensive care unit, Bührke said.
Police told people to avoid the city center.
“There are dead and injured. Please avoid the area,” the North Rhine-Westphalia regional police wrote on their official Twitter account. “We are on site.”
Large portions of the city center were still shut down hours after the incident, as helicopters hovered in the sky and police officers with large rifles blocked streets.
Images of the city center showed a small delivery van that appeared to have hopped onto a sidewalk off the street and plowed through the seats and tables of an outdoor cafe. Chairs were scattered and broken across a small cobblestone plaza. The incident took place at the square surrounding the Kiepenkerl statue, a city landmark that commemorates a traveling peddler.
“I heard a loud, dull noise and suddenly everyone started shouting,” a witness, Steffen Simonsen, told Germany’s ARD broadcaster. “Everyone started running toward the square and about a minute later, a police car had already arrived.”
The Kiepenkerl area is dotted with boutiques, high-end shops and cafes, and is a favorite of both tourists and locals. Saturday was the warmest day of the year, with weather hitting 76 degrees in the city of 300,000, drawing people onto the streets to lounge in the sunshine.
“The weather was fantastic, and all restaurants had put chairs outside. There were lots of people,” Simonsen said.
Local news outlets said that police were already deployed in larger-than-normal numbers in the city center that afternoon to keep watch over a pro-Kurdish demonstration. When the van plowed across the square midafternoon, officers were able to divert quickly.
“Terrible news from Münster,” wrote German Justice Minister Katarina Barley on Twitter. “Our thoughts are with the victims and their family members. Thank you to the rescue workers on the scene. We must do everything to clarify the background of the incident.”
German Chancellor Angela Merkel was being kept apprised of the situation, officials said.
Vehicles have been used in terrorist attacks across Europe in recent years, including in Germany. In December 2016, a Tunisian man whose asylum request had been rejected crashed a truck through a crowded Christmas market in Berlin, killing 12 and injuring 56.
The incident in Münster also came a year to the day after a man driving a stolen delivery truck slammed into a crowd in Stockholm, killing five.
Luisa Beck and Rick Noack in Berlin contributed to this report. Birnbaum reported from Brussels.
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