Villeurbanne (AFP)

Saturday 16H30, a man begins to stab blindly around him at the bus station Laurent Bonnevay de Villeurbanne. Scene of terror, it's panic, people run, others are on the ground. Passersby intervene and succeed in stopping the assailant.

"A gentleman who was at the stop of 57 began to stab in all directions," told AFP a girl, the tanker stained with blood. Sobs in her voice, she tells: a stab in the ear of a man, then a woman touched and down.

"Nobody came to help her so I kicked her on her to protect her, to prevent him from stabbing him". She will finally succeed in placing her in a bus shelter.

People flee, take refuge where they can, many on buses, report firefighters, who will quickly be fifty on the spot. The provisional record shows one death, a 19-year-old, three wounded in absolute emergency, five less seriously injured and many shocked witnesses.

Sofiane, a 17-year-old Villeurbanne, tells AFPTV that he was coming back from the scooter pool when he saw "a gentleman with two knives in his hand and people coming down from the C8 bus running".

In his very precise testimony, he evokes, shocked and shocked, the deceased victim. According to him, the young man stopped the assailant and told him to stop. The latter then "stabbed him and when he was on the ground, he continued". Sofiane explains that she came then to his side.

- Stopped before the subway -

The suspect then leaves the bus station, takes a flight of stairs and heads to an esplanade that leads to an entrance to the Laurent Bonnevay de Villeurbanne metro, according to the story provided to AFP by TCL, the Lyons public transport.

Many TCL agents are present on this pole of exchange of the network in this crowded Saturday afternoon, two days of the return to school. And this is where passers-by and four bus drivers come into contact with the attacker and manage to isolate him, according to this same source.

In a video posted on social networks and broadcast by many TV channels, we see a man with matte skin, short black beard, well cut, sweet black hood and red sneakers with a blade and a small fork in a hand discussing with men, before throwing his weapons and squatting in front of a metro elevator.

Then the police arrived, arrested him and put him in custody. According to a police source, he is a 33-year-old Afghan asylum seeker.

He was "not at all consistent, he showed us his veins," says Sofiane. No TCL agent was injured but some were shocked and taken care of.

Local elected officials did not fail to emphasize the "bravery" of these people who "took their responsibilities".

"Obviously it could have been more serious since he was stopped on the way to the subway entrance, he was going to be in a confined environment, and we do not know how it could have happened. ", commented to AFP Hervé Redon, deputy departmental secretary of the alliance police union in the Rhone.

"The lesson for the citizens is the caution and interest in reporting any suspicious behavior that is likely to be, and the importance of taking pictures and filming, and possibly being able to work together without put his life in danger, "he added.

© 2019 AFP