\u201cPolice were called at 11.20am to reports of a single vehicle crash on Downing St, Glenfield.<\/p>\n
\u201cTwo people have fled the vehicle, and one was sighted carrying what appeared to be a firearm.<\/p>\n
\u201cGlenfield Mall was placed into a precautionary lockdown. It has now been lifted.\u201c<\/p>\n
Police said schools and childcare centres nearby were temporarily placed into lockdown. These had since lifted.<\/p>\n
Shoppers could expect to see an increased police presence while inquiries continued.<\/p>\n
Glenfield Mall was evacuated and four schools went into lockdown after a person was seen with a firearm following a car crash.<\/p>\n
Those caught up in the mayhem described chaotic scenes around the mall.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was evacuated, armed police everywhere, all entrances closed, fire engine at the back,\u201d one shopper said.<\/p>\n
\u201cCarpark chaos took ages to get out, and people were trying to come in, being turned around.\u201d<\/p>\n
A police cordon had since been put around an upper level of the mall.<\/p>\n
The crashed sedan appeared to have been driven into a pole on the fourth floor of the carpark. The driver\u2019s side and front passenger doors were still open, as was the boot. The engine was still running.<\/p>\n
Quin, a worker at a Glenfield Mall restaurant, said he saw a lot of police arrive at the mall with \u201cheavy firearms\u201d before it was evacuated.<\/p>\n
His friend, who works on the third floor, texted him and said she \u201csaw a guy throw a gun in the trash\u201d.<\/p>\n
Tyler, an employee at a jewellery store in the mall, described the evacuation as \u201cextremely chaotic\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was putting a piercing in and I saw police running past the shop,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Two customers in the shop rushed out the door as the evacuation was announced.<\/p>\n
Shoppers were made to wait outside the building for about 30 to 40 minutes as police patrolled the area with firearms.<\/p>\n
But another nearby shop worker said people hadn\u2019t seemed too stressed about the evacuation and \u201cjust wanted to return to shopping\u201d.<\/p>\n
She said police had arrived at the shopping centre and \u201cshouted the mall\u2019s shut\u201d.<\/p>\n
She described the atmosphere as calm.<\/p>\n
Glenfield College wrote on Facebook that it had been advised to go into lockdown because of events at Glenfield Mall.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will continue to provide updates on our website as often as possible. Please do not come to the school or phone the school as you will not be attended to, and this may cause disruption to the management of this incident and could potentially place yourselves and\/or our staff and students\u2019 safety at risk.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll further updates will be provided on the school website.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a message to parents, principal Rakesh Govind warned them not to visit or contact the school or their children via phone or email, stating that any further updates would be shared on the school website.<\/p>\n
Wairau Valley Special School said on its website that it had gone into lockdown because of an incident nearby. <\/p>\n
\u201cPlease do not come to the school or phone the school as you will not be attended to and this may cause disruption to the management of this incident and could potentially place yourselves and\/or our staff and students\u2019 safety at risk.\u201d<\/p>\n
A video from the scene showed several police vehicles outside the mall as well as groups of shoppers gathered outside after the evacuation.<\/p>\n
More to come.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cPolice were called at 11.20am to reports of a single vehicle crash on Downing St, Glenfield. \u201cTwo people…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":359449,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[7814,3952,29059,36662,679,3011,90342,305,78,296,5840,28360,52058,36661,111,43,139,529,69,675,6649,13743,16739,18484,1516,39537,102],"class_list":["post-359448","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-armed","tag-aucklands","tag-descended","tag-evacuate","tag-forced","tag-four","tag-glenfield","tag-have","tag-in","tag-into","tag-least","tag-lockdown","tag-mall","tag-nearby","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-north","tag-nz","tag-police","tag-schools","tag-sent","tag-shoppers","tag-shore","tag-staff","tag-swarm","tag-with"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/359448","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=359448"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/359448\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/359449"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=359448"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=359448"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=359448"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}