TORONTO — Two men were killed Monday after a pickup truck plowed into pedestrians on the side of a road in the town of Amke, in eastern Quebec. A senior Canadian official quickly ruled out a terrorist attack or national security incident.
A spokeswoman for the provincial police said nine other people were injured, two of whom are considered critical.
Sgt. Helen St-Pierre said the 38-year-old driver, a local resident, turned himself in to police and was arrested on suspicion of a fatal hit-and-run.
A senior government official familiar with the matter said the incident was not related to terrorism or national security. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.
The authorities gave no motive.
St-Pierre said the dead were two men, one in his 60s and the other in his 70s. Of the injured, she added, two were seriously injured and the other seven were being evaluated.
St-Pierre said investigators and reconstruction experts are working to establish the circumstances of the accident.
“Everything indicates that it was an isolated incident, that there is no longer any danger in the area, and there is only one suspect,” she said.
The accident occurred just after 3 p.m. along St-Benoit Street in Amqui, a town about 350,220 miles northeast of Quebec City.
The Provincial Health Board confirmed that a “code orange” had been declared at Amki Hospital, which generally indicates a situation with a large number of casualties.
Alan Gilbert, a truck driver, said he was driving to Amke when he saw several ambulances serving about four or maybe five people spread out about 500 yards away.
He saw a police officer perform CPR on a person lying on the ground. He said there didn’t appear to be any children in the group.
Police said last month in Laval, Quebec A man driving a city bus deliberately rammed into a daycare center, killing two children.
in 2021, A man used a pickup truck to kill four members of an immigrant family in London, Ontarioin what Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau described as a hate crime directed against Muslims.
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