A survivor of a mass shooting in a New Zealand mosque said a man wrestled the shooter’s gun out of his hands and then chased him out of the mosque in a bid to save more lives.
Syed Mazharuddin, a witness of the shooting in Christchurch’s Linwood Mosque on March 15, 2019, told the New Zealand Herald newspaper that a “young guy who usually takes care of the mosque” tackled the gunman.
He said the man “pounced” on the gunman, “took his gun,” and then chased him out of the building.
“The hero tried to chase and he couldn’t find the trigger in the gun … he ran behind him but there were people waiting for him in the car and he fled,” Mazharuddin said.
Seven people were killed in the Linwood Mosque and 41 people were killed in a connected attack at the Al Noor Mosque 3 1/2 miles away. One person died at Christchurch Hospital, where 48 others, including children, are being treated for gunshot wounds.
Al Noor Mosque.
Khaled Al-Nobani, a survivor of the shooting at the Al Noor Mosque, told the Herald that a man tried to take the gun from the shooter at that mosque but that the gunman “shot him straight away.”
Mazharuddin told the Herald that the shooter fired at people who were praying at the Linwood Mosque.
“Just around the entrance door there were elderly people sitting there praying, and he just started shooting at them,” he said.
Mazharuddin said he has friends who were shot in the chest. He said one was shot in the head.
One of his friends was killed, he said. “I ran out and then the police came, and they didn’t let me come back in again, so I couldn’t save my friend,” he said. “He was bleeding heavily.”
Survivors shared their accounts of New Zealand’s ‘darkest day’
Other survivors have shared their accounts of the terrorist attacks, including seeing piles of bodies, some dead.
One witness told CNN that he lay still “praying to God, oh God please let this guy run out of bullets.”
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern described March 15, 2019, as “one of New Zealand’s darkest days.”
Police have charged one man with murder, and two other people are in custody.
The gunman appeared to livestream the shooting on Facebook, and a manifesto claiming responsibility for the shooting praises far-right terrorists and describes hatred for Muslims and immigrants.
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