"He drove straight on the sidewalk and started purposefully driving over people. It is impossible to describe the panic that ensued, people were trying to save themselves wherever they could, there were many children at this July 14 celebration, we saw many people on the ground, including the deceased, towels were used to make bandages for those wounded," a witness told the BFMTV channel.
Other eyewitnesses said that the crowd had first mistaken the gunshots for fireworks.
"When everything calmed down, we looked outside [from the restaurant] there was a white truck and we saw that it, drove to the embankment and rammed the crowd, restaurants provided sheets to cover the bodies of the victims," another witness said.
The driver was shot dead by police, French Interior Ministry spokesperson Pierre-Henry Brandet has confirmed. According to ID documents found inside the truck, the driver was a 31-year-old man who was a resident of Nice of Tunisian origin.
