London Driver Arrested After Crashing Into Barriers Outside U.K. Parliament

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Police officers near the site where a car crashed outside the Houses of Parliament in London on Tuesday.CreditHannah Mckay/Reuters

By Kimiko de Freytas-Tamura

Aug. 14, 2018

LONDON — A speeding car struck and injured several pedestrians and cyclists then crashed into a security barrier just outside the Houses of Parliament in London early Tuesday, in what the police said they were treating as a terrorist attack.

About a dozen armed police officers swarmed a silver Ford and pointed their weapons at it, before handcuffing the driver.

“He was arrested on suspicion of terrorist offenses,” and the Counter-Terrorism Command was leading the investigation, the Metropolitan Police said in a statement. “At this stage, we are treating this as a terrorist incident.”

The police said the driver, in his late 20s, was the only person in the car, and that no weapons had been found in the vehicle.

Officers set up a security cordon around Parliament Square, with around a dozen police cars and ambulances parked at the site, while helicopters circled above. Armed officers stood guard, and video footage on Twitter showed them urging people to leave the area.

Westminster Bridge was closed to vehicles, pedestrians were directed to alternative routes, and the nearby, heavily used Westminster subway station was closed. None of those injured were believed to be in life-threatening condition, the police said.

Witnesses told television stations that the episode seemed deliberate; the car was traveling too fast, they said, and did not swerve before striking people or the security barrier.

A still from video footage of armed officers surrounding the car after the crash.CreditITN, via Associated Press

One witness, Jason Williams, told ITV’s “Good Morning Britain”: “Basically, I’ve seen a man driving a vehicle, and he’s gone into one of the bollards. There was a loud bang. Straight away I thought, ‘Oh no, this is another terrorist attack.’ So I just started to run, and the police were saying, ‘Get out, get out of the area.’ ”

George Pascal, 31, a maintenance worker at the Parliament building, said that “there was big smoke and everyone was sent to safe places,” and that the building, also known as the Palace of Westminster, had been locked down. “It felt quite claustrophobic because you couldn’t move anywhere.”

“Everything happened so quickly,” he said. “Police were running around with guns and everyone was mobilizing.”

According to a police statement, “At 7.37 a.m. today, a car was in collision with barriers outside the Houses of Parliament.” The statement said that the male driver of the car had been detained by officers at the scene. “A number of pedestrians have been injured,” it continued.

Prime Minister Theresa May said on Twitter, “My thoughts are with those injured,” and she thanked “the emergency services for their immediate and courageous response.”

Westminster, the locus of British politics, has been under tight security since last year. In March 2017, an assailant driving a sport utility vehicle mowed down pedestrians and stabbed a police officer, prompting the evacuation of the prime minister. At least four people, including the assailant, were killed, and at least 40 others wounded.

A month later, a 27-year-old man carrying knives was arrested near Parliament by the police, who charged him with planning a terrorist attack. No one was hurt.

And in June that year, three men killed six civilians near London Bridge and the nearby Borough Market, and wounded dozens more.

Parliament was already surrounded by lines of crash bollards, balustrades and steel barricades, put in place after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States and the bombings on July 7, 2005, in London. Terrorist attacks in Paris and Brussels in 2016 led to even tighter security.

Richard Martyn-Hemphill and Prashant S. Rao contributed reporting.