Christchurch mosque shooting: Witnesses describe hearing ‘hundreds and hundreds’ of shots fired
Witnesses have described hearing “hundreds and hundreds” of shots fired as a gunman opened fire at Christchurch’s Masjid Al Noor and Linwood Mosques.
True Crime
Don't miss out on the headlines from True Crime. Followed categories will be added to My News.
Friday prayers had just started at Christchurch’s Masjid Al Noor and Linwood Mosques.
For Muslims, it is the busiest congregation of the week.
In terror gunman Brenton Tarrant’s mind, he knew this peak time of worship would mean mass casualties.
“He came through and started shooting everyone in the mosque … everywhere,” witness Ahmad Al-Mahmoud, 37, said.
In a nearly 60-minute spree, Tarrant, 28, dressed in army fatigues and a motorcycle helmet, killed up to 49 people and injured at least 50 — all believed to be Muslims observing their sacred prayers.
LATEST UPDATES: Australian gunman opens fire in Christchurch mosque
SHOOTER: Who is Aussie Brenton Tarrant?
MANIFESTO: Australian terrorist’s mosque attack motive revealed
REACTION: Sonny Bill William’s tears over Christchurch attack
Witnesses described hearing “hundreds and hundreds” of shots fired, with some locals nearby mistaking the massacre for construction works.
At the Masjid Al Noor mosque, on Deans Avenue in the quiet, leafy suburb of Riccarton, up to 500 of Christchurch’s 2000 Muslim population had gathered to pray.
Ten minutes into the service, chaos began.
Before he even walked through the door, Tarrant shot his first victim.
Inside the building, Tarrant opened fire, screaming “let’s get this party started”, as prayer goers scrambled across green mats in a desperate bid to escape.
“They had to smash the door, the glass and window to get out,” Mr Al-Mahmoud told Stuff.co.nz.
“We were trying to get everyone to run away from that area because we couldn’t open the door for everyone.”
One man who managed to escape saw his wife motionless on the footpath and had to be held back by his friends.
“My wife is dead,” he wailed.
Another man described seeing children shot, adding “there were bodies all over me”.
Indian restaurant manager Prakash Sapkota, whose business Arjee Bhajee is around the corner from the Masjid Al Noor mosque, said he first realised something was wrong when he started seeing barefoot people running past covered in blood.
“I was at the counter and we started seeing a lot of people with no shoes running and crying with a lot of blood,” he told News Corp Australia.
“People were scared. We had to close our shop and were are staying here until we can leave.”
He said one of his friends was in the mosque but escaped the shooting by hiding in the toilets.
“He saw many of his friends dead on the ground,” Mr Sapkota said.
Even those running late to prayers did not escape.
Local motel Argyle on the Park owner Lena Borodin said Tarrant stopped his beige Subaru and shot an elderly Muslim man in the side of the torso as the man was walking towards the mosque, oblivious to the bloodshed ahead.
The man in his 70s lay on the footpath bleeding as Tarrant then sped away to his next destination.
At the Linwood mosque, it was the elderly he killed first.
Those with knees too stiff to crouch on the floor were seated in plastic chairs at the back of the hall.
“They were basically all shot,” witness Syed Ahmed said.
He described “indiscriminate shooting” — no purpose, no control, just constant offloading of a machine gun.
Ahmed escaped by crawling across the ground to hide in a storeroom and said he saw one person shot in the head and at least three women lying on the floor.
Another man inside the mosque said: “I was thinking that he must run out of bullets. I was basically waiting for that and praying to God, oh God please let this guy run out of bullets.”
He said the shooting went for around 20 minutes. At one point it stopped and he went to leave but was told to stay put by another man.
“When it stopped, the first time I went, one guy was sitting out just beside a wall, and he told me ‘no, no’ and I went back again where I was. The next thing the guy came and shot this guy who told me not to get out. That was a sad moment and I know that guy and he shot him straight in the chest.”
Len Peneha said he heard dozens of shots and went into the mosque to help.
“I saw dead people everywhere. There were three in the hallway, at the door leading into the mosque, and people inside the mosque,” he said.
“I don’t understand how anyone could do this to these people, to anyone. It’s ridiculous.”
Mohan Ibrahim was inside the mosque when the shooting began and told the New Zealand Herald he thought it was an electric shock “but then all these people started running”.
“I was in the mosque. It’s a big mosque and there were more than 200 people inside. The gunmen came from the backside. Gunshots went on for a long time. We had to jump the wall to escape. I saw lots of broken glass and bricks on the backside of the mosque.
“I still have friends inside. I have been calling my friends but there are many I haven’t heard from. I am scared for my friends’ lives.”
Neighbours near the Masjid Al Noor also ran to help the wounded.
Zinzan Hawke, who lives with three flatmates, near the mosque, woke to chaos and rushed to help a male shooting victim in his front garden.
“It’s just human nature to help someone in that situation,” he said.
“I had to deal with that really quickly considering I just woke up.
“We called an ambulance and police and I applied pressure to the wound.”
The Muslim man told them multiple shots had been fired.
Hawke said the man said “he didn’t see the armed gunman but he heard bullets ringing around, one had just missed his stomach area. He would have had a far more serious injury in that case.
“I thought he was making it up … I didn’t realise something of this magnitude could happen in New Zealand.
“I was just in an utter panic.”
Another anonymous witness told Stuff the man had “a big gun and lots of bullets”.
“He came through and started shooting everyone in the mosque, like everywhere,” he said, mimicking a spraying action.
The man cut his hand punching through a glass door to escape.
“I had to smash the door, the glass from the window and from the door to get everyone out.
“We were trying to get everyone to run away from this area, but we couldn’t open the door for everyone.”
Carl Pomare was driving past the mosque when he saw people running onto the footpath.
“As they were running right opposite us, people were hitting the ground,” Pomare said.
He said he heard rapid shots “like fireworks”.
He and two people in construction truck formed a cordon at the southern end of Deans Avenue in Christchurch.
“There was no one else there, we were the first responders.”
“My colleague attended to one of the guys who was shot on the footpath and that person has since passed away,” Pomare said.
A father was nursing his five-year-old daughter and asking for help. She had been shot.
“We looked at it thinking we’ve got to get this little five-year-old girl to the hospital now otherwise she’s going to die.
“It was a pretty scary situation because there were still other shots being fired at the time inside the mosque,” he said.
Christchurch business owner and parent, Emma Turnbull, 43, was caught in the police cordon around Hagley Park, as she tried to get her son from school.
She describes the chaos and terror as reopening wounds barely healed from the deadly Christchurch 2011 earthquake, which killed 185 people.
“It’s the end of our innocence,” she told News Corp Australia.
“We think we lived in a secure place and something like this happens to other people.
“It’s naivety. We thought we wouldn’t get earthquakes and we did
“They’re different things but the unsettle us in the same way.
“I feel incredibly sad — it is so upsetting and terrifying.
“We are very used to hearing police sirens and helicopters. That is not unusual. We are hardened to these situations.
“But how will we heal and come back from this magnitude of destruction?”
— additional reporting Matthew Benns
‘Dial-a-dealer’ mum caught with drugs in car — and kids in back seat
A Sydney “dial-a-dealer’ mum has been caught selling cocaine and ecstasy out of her car on a Saturday night, with her three small children sitting in the back seat.
Chilling update in bucks party rape case
A groom has failed to show any remorse after he gang raped three teenagers during his bucks party weekend, a court has been told.