British police: At least 19 dead after ‘possible’ terrorist incident at Ariana Grande concert

May 22 (UPI) — At least 19 people were killed and 50 injured Monday night in a “possible” terrorist incident at an Ariana Grande concert in Britain in what witnesses said were explosions at a venue in Manchester, authorities said.

“This is currently being treated as a terrorist incident until police know otherwise,” Greater Manchester Police said in a statement on Twitter.

Police said there were a number of confirmed fatalities and others injured at the concert at Manchester Arena. Some of the concertgoers said they heard a loud bang in the back of the arena after the last song.

“We saw young girls with blood on them, everyone was screaming and people were running,” Sasina Akhtar, told The Manchester Evening News.

“It shook,” Hannah Dane told The Guardian, “then everyone screamed and tried to get out.”

Manchester Arena, which opened in 1995, has a capacity of 21,000 spectators but it was not clear how many people were in attendance.

Grande, 23, “is OK,” said Joseph Carozza, Grande’s publicist. “We are further investigating what happened.”

The international tour, promoting Grande’s 2016 album Dangerous Woman, was scheduled to continue Thursday at the O2 Arena in London.

The incident evoked the November 2015 terrorist attacks in Paris, which included a deadly assault on an concert arena.

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