How festivalgoers saw the city’s ‘darkest day’
VANCOUVER—The smells of crispy lumpia, caramelized plantains and other Filipino street foods beckoned attendees of a festival as they flooded out of a concert on an unusually sunny spring day in this Canadian city.
As the sun set, lines for food trucks began to wrap around the block. A slow trickle of cars entered the closed street to replenish vendor supplies. Then, one driver hit the accelerator, killing 11 people and injuring dozens at the Lapu-Lapu Day festival on Saturday night.
Here is how people witnessed the tragedy.
Bodies flying
Clothing vendor Kris Pangilinan said he would never forget the sound of bodies hitting the hood of the black Audi sport utility vehicle (SUV) as it rammed into the crowd.
“All I can remember is seeing bodies flying up in the air higher than the food trucks themselves and landing on the ground and people yelling and screaming,” he said.
Adonis Quita pulled his 9-year-old son out of the way as the SUV plowed into the line of families waiting for their food.
For the young boy, who had just relocated to Vancouver from the Philippines, the festival celebrating British Columbia’s large Filipino population was his first taste of home away from home.
But now, his father said the boy cannot close his eyes without seeing flashbacks of bloody bodies, some as young as age 5, hitting the pavement.
Interim Police Chief Steve Rai proclaimed that grim Saturday as “the darkest day in Vancouver’s history.”
Children screaming
Bodies covered in white tarps lined the row of food trucks as ambulances rushed injured people to the hospital.
“Those families are living every family’s nightmare,” Prime Minister Mark Carney said.
Carayn Nulada was in Vancouver General Hospital’s emergency room early Sunday morning trying to find news about her brother, who was run down in the attack and suffered multiple broken bones. Doctors identified him by presenting the family with his wedding ring in a pill bottle. He was stable but needed surgeries.
Nulada used her body to shield her granddaughter and grandson from the SUV as it barreled by. Her daughter, meanwhile, was struck in the arm and fell down but was able to get up quickly.
The family recalled children screaming and pale-faced victims lying on the ground.
Of the more than two dozen injured, some remain in critical condition and others have not yet been identified, Rai said late Sunday.
‘Horrible to see’
Others who attended the festival are struggling to process the trauma.
Mohamad Sariman had been helping at his wife’s food truck when he heard a loud boom that he initially thought was an explosion. He looked out the truck’s window and saw a disfigured body on the ground. When he and his wife opened the door, he said they saw another body.
“It was really, really traumatic,” Sariman said.
Vincent Reynon, 17, was leaving the festival with his girlfriend after 8 p.m. when he saw fire trucks and police officers rushing to where the festival was being held. They decided to circle back to see what was going on. He said they saw people crying as he approached, then bodies on the ground when they arrived at the scene.
“It was horrible to see,” Reynon said. “It was like something straight out of a horror movie or a nightmare.”
Lorena Sales, 17, similarly ran back to the festival from the bus stop when she saw ambulances rushing to the scene.
The image of a woman who had her skull crushed in the collision is burned into Sales’ memory, she said.
Bouquets, candles
Community members gathered at Vancouver’s Filipino Fellowship Baptist Church on Sunday to mourn those who died and pray for the injured.
Nathaly Nairn and her 15-year-old daughter brought flowers to the vigil after attending the festival the night before.
“Now we’re just here supporting our community, trying to help my daughter process what we saw yesterday, trying to be there for the Filipino community that has been there for us so much,” Nairn said as she wiped away tears.
