london, anyone can come in and out. it s the borough market area, the london bridge area. a lot of workers getting lunch perhaps around that time. a very hot tourist area. anyone can come in and out. it s a very open area, very popular, very, very busy. we do not this incident is different from the one in 2017, in terms of that vehicle. as far as we know, right now. julie: elena petrov, reuters, thank you very much. if you have new information, please let us know. meantime we have chris swecker, former fbi director, who joins in on the phone. let s talk about the video we are about to show. finally we have video that has been circulating. several eyewitness taking video from their cell phone of the in. the aftermath, in fact. you see one man running around the bridge very dramatically, leanne i. that is a bystander. he grabbed the weapon after it was taken away. then you have the police officers that arrived.
stairs to where the embankment is. that s where these attackers, according to eyewitnesses, went after getting out of the van, the white van that they used to swerve as has been described in an s shape all the way down london bridge as they tried to mount that curb and eventually mounting the curb and hitting people on the bridge. we know that at least 48 people are still in hospital being taken care of. some of those in critical condition. we know also the death toll has risen to seven, according to police. it is now seven dead. the metropolitan police chief says that while they believe they have killed all the assailants, and she put that at eight minutes after the first call in the borough market area. we ve heard lots and lots of eyewitnesses talking about really how it unfolded. this has been an interesting development in terms of how it unfolded with many, many eyewitnesses painting that
an abundance of caution. the attack began when a van swerved into crowds of pedestrians on the london bridge. witnesses say the attackers got out of the van and headed on foot to the borough market area, where they began stabbing people. london s mayor says the city is stepping up its police presence in the wake of the attack. now, it is the latest in a string of terrorist attacks involving vehicles ramming pedestrians. so is this the new method for self-radicalized individuals? the director of the international center for the study of radicalization and political violence joining us. we also have cnn national security analyst. thank you for joining us. peter, i don t know whether you just heard da slrl babu, the fo assistant at the metropolitan police.
they spend around 50 miles per hour across the bridge swerving onto the sidewalk than the road, hitting pedestrians then they smashed into some balusters at the end of the bridge. they didn t stop, they hopped out and ran about five or six blocks to the borough market area on the south side of the river. for people who know new york the best comparison i can make the south street seaport. it has shops and restaurants and markets. that is when they went on their stabbing spree there. people said they were wearing what look like suicide vest. they been destroyed described as fake by some accounts but maybe just malfunctioning by other accounts. eyewitnesses say they were screaming out, god is great. no confirmation of that but it
channeling them into the right place. it was really it wasn t a chaotic scene but certainly there were some people very frightened as they came out. london bridge obviously a major london landmark. borough market as well was rehabb rehabbed. it s got tons of cafes and restaurants now. it s a hip area in london for young people to go out, have a drink and get some food, especially on a warm saturday night. and it was very, very full. even when we got here, after the attack happened, it was still very full. there were still paem out on the streets a couple of streets down from here, but also still out there near the borough market area with them obviously all coming out. the weather was fairly warm. there were a lot of people out having drinks, having dinner. it was really, really a packed scene. and that of course was also the case when the van went on to london bridge. there were also people there on the pavement walking around. the van apparently started swerving from side to si