Residents shocked by worst massacre in recent years

Residents in the sleepy coastal city of Zhuhai are reeling from the shock of the worst massacre in the country in recent years, after a man drove an SUV into a crowd exercising at a sports complex on the evening of Nov 11, killing 35 and wounding 43.

- Joyce ZK Lim

People have been thronging the venue since the police announced the death toll on Nov 12, leaving flowers and lighting candles outside the barricaded facility now secured by a heavy police presence.

The tributes were moved out of the public eye, into a restricted area within the sports complex that only the victims' families could access, staff told The Straits Times on Nov 12.

"I felt first anger, and then grief," said a resident who turned up to offer flowers on the night of Nov 12, and choked up while speaking to The Straits Times.

"I never thought this sort of thing would happen around me," said the man who lives and works in the area but declined to be named.

Another man who works nearby also said he grappled with the news of the attack, which he learnt of through WeChat messages from friends.

"Zhuhai is generally a place with a slow pace of life... where life is easy and comfortable," said Mr Li, who is in his 20s, of the city of 2.4 million bordering Macau.

Residents visited hospitals and blood donation vans to donate blood to help the injured shortly after the attack, local media reported. Taxi drivers were reported to have provided free rides to ferry blood donors.

While the local police issued a short statement on the night of the attack, it was not until late on Nov 12 that the news was widely reported on national media.

Videos showing a car mowing down a group of people around a running track, as well as victims lying on the ground motionless, were quickly scrubbed from social media.