A woman stabbed 18 people at Hamburg’s train station on Friday evening, leaving four in life-threatening condition.
Police arrested the 39-year-old suspect at the scene. She attacked people on the platform between tracks 13 and 14 at around 6 p.m., just as a train was waiting. The station prohibits knives and other weapons.
Authorities believe the woman acted alone. They are investigating whether mental health issues influenced her actions, said police spokesperson Florian Abbenseth.
Among the 17 injured, five are in critical condition, six are seriously hurt, and seven have minor injuries. It is not clear if the woman sustained any injuries.
In response, police closed four tracks overnight. This resulted in delays and diversions for some long-distance trains.
Hamburg’s main train station, the busiest in Germany, serves as a hub for local, regional, and long-distance trains. With 550,000 passengers passing through daily, it ranks second in Europe, following Paris’s Gare du Nord.
The attack follows a similar incident in Germany. On March 3, a car rammed into a crowd on a busy shopping street in Mannheim, about 289 miles south of Hamburg. The crash killed a man and a woman, and police arrested one man in connection with the incident.
