Tourists who survived the Berlin Christmas market terror attack saw ‘rivers of blood’ as the truck atrocity unfolded
A BRITISH tourist described the moment he saw the bodies of children among the wreckage after the sickening Berlin Christmas market attack.
Mike Fox, from Birmingham, said the truck that killed 12 people and injured dozens had missed him by about three metres, while another tourist described 'rivers of blood' in the aftermath of the massacre.
An aerial view of the carnage after the lorry struck
"There were children in the market. My girlfriend saw a child under the truck," he said.
"You do what you can to help who you can, really," he said.
"It happened so fast that there was nothing we could do to stop it - if we'd tried to stop it we would have been crushed."
A 21-year-old and 22-year-old student, both from Washington, US, were on the other side of Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church and heading to the area which was targeted when they became aware of the commotion.
One of the students told the Press Association: "We started seeing people running and hearing ambulances from all directions so we walked over. It was carnage everywhere. There was blood all over the floor.
"There were people lying on the floor - I am not sure what their condition was - I could count about eight lying down.
Rhys Meredith, from Cardiff , was visiting the Christmas market in Breitscheidplatz, in central Berlin, with his girlfriend when the truck veered off the road and smashed into market stalls.
At least 12 people were killed and and 48 injured. "We were having a good walk around, soaking up the scene, soaking up the atmosphere," Rhys told the BBC.
"We had bought food and had we carried on we would have walked down the path the truck would have been down and we more than likely wouldn't be having this conversation right now.
"It missed us by about ten feet before veering into the middle of the road, taking out stalls.
"There was clearly no attempt to try and slow down. We've seen stalls obliterated into nothing."
Mr Meredith then described the "absolutely horrific" scene as he tried to push Christmas stalls off people who were trapped.
His girlfriend also went to the aid of a number of people including a man with "very severe head injuries".
";The biggest mental image I have is there were two rivers of blood going down the floor.
"Nobody was really helping anybody. People were running. It was like every man for themselves. It was dusty and chaotic."
Meanwhile Thomas Butler, from Uddingston, in Scotland, had been in the city only a few hours when he and his girlfriend decided to visit the market to do some Christmas shopping.
The crash happened in Breitscheidplatz, a major public square in the city in a chilling echo of the deadly terror attack in Nice earlier this year.
The pair were walking through the stalls when Mr Butler caught sight of the lorry.
He said: “Before we knew it the big lorry had turned a corner and I had it in my eye shot and we heard all this noise and all the people started running towards myself and my partner.
“They were screaming so we assumed the worst, I grabbed [my girlfriend] and we just ran.”
Mr Butler and his girlfriend escaped to the subway where they warned other people “don’t go upstairs”.
He told STV News the police arrived on the scene “pretty quickly.”
He said: “They were saying to us it’s a traffic accident and I was saying no I have seen the lorry it wasn’t an accident”.
Thomas also uploaded a Facebook Live video of the aftermath of the horror.
He said on the clip: “I was at the Berlin Christmas Market and a truck has just ploughed right into the Christmas Market.
“We were literally 30 seconds away from it.
“I grabbed Jen and ran down into the subway station.
“The full street was running.
“It was scary stuff.”