South Jersey Man Recalls Moments After Shots Fired Injuring 2 Police Officers At Wawa Welcome America Fireworks Show In Philadelphia
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Two police officers are out of the hospital following a shooting near Philadelphia's Fourth of July fireworks show on the Ben Franklin Parkway on Monday night. Video from the ground shows people running for their lives along the parkway, while fireworks were still going off.
Eyewitness News spoke to a South Jersey man who was right in the middle of all the chaos. Blake Miller, of Maple Shade, says he, along with thousands of people, were enjoying the Wawa Welcome American concert and Fourth of July festivities and within minutes mayhem ensued.
He just remembers running and like so many others, he was unsure where to run too.
"The barricades were being knocked over. It was just a mad dash of people running from every direction," Miller said. "From this experience that happened today, I will no longer be going to crowded big areas, especially during the Fourth. I will never take my children anywhere to a crowded event like that."
Cellphone video shows the confusion, people were just trying to escape to a safer place -- anywhere other than the parkway.
Families with little children were running aimlessly.
Miller was standing in front of the building where police thought the shooter was inside. He gave us his timeline of the events that unfolded.
"9:48, 9:49, when you heard shots rang out in the middle of the crowd and you heard everybody going 'shooter, shooting.' There was chatter on the radios, couldn't tell the difference between gunfire and fireworks. It was just traumatic hearing about children being lost from their parents, being separated. There was just really nowhere else to go, other than as far away from the situation. Nobody wanted it to be another situation where you are potentially one of the 10, 20 people that were possibly going to be shot," Miller said.
Police say an officer assigned to the Montgomery County bomb squad was shot in the right shoulder. Another officer assigned to highway patrol suffered a graze wound to the head. Both officers have been released from the hospital.
City officials provide updates on the July 4th Benjamin Franklin Parkway shooting in Philadelphia https://t.co/1wLWW2vHqV
— Philadelphia OEM (@PhilaOEM) July 5, 2022
Former Deputy Police Commissioner Joe Sullivan walked CBS3 through the early stages of the investigation and the police response.
As of Monday morning, no bystanders were injured. Local residents were asked to shelter in place.
CBS3 is told police locked down the area for at least 15 blocks creating a track pile-up as people were trying to leave the city.
Following the mass shooting at a Fourth of July parade in Highland Park, Illinois, Philadelphia police said they had Emergency Response Teams on standby throughout the city to respond to areas where additional resources are needed, so authorities were able to react quickly to the chaos.