All of the nine children who were injured were stabbed and six are in a critical condition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Two adults are also in a critical condition. Merseyside Police Chief Constable Serena Kennedy said: “We believe that the adults who were injured were bravely trying to protect the children who were being attacked.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The King and Queen<\/strong>\u00a0are among those who have sent their “deepest sympathies” to the families of those affected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A 17-year-old boy from Banks in Lancashire, born in Cardiff in Wales, has been arrested on suspicion of murder and attempted murder.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Police were called to reports of a knife attack at an address in Southport at 11.47am this morning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Chief Constable Kennedy said when officers arrived they were “shocked to find” several children had been “subjected to a ferocious attack and had suffered serious injuries”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She added: “It is understood that the children were attending a Taylor Swift event at a dance school when the offender, armed with a knife, walked into the premises and started to attack the children inside.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n The chief constable said the suspect’s motive is unclear at this early stage but the investigation is not being treated as terror-related.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Paramedics encounter ‘devastating scene’<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Sky News understands the stabbings took place at a community centre called Hart Space, often used for mother and baby classes, on Hart Street in the Merseyside town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A poster shows a “Taylor Swift Yoga and Dance Workshop” aimed at children aged between primary school years two and six (7-11 years old) was taking place at the centre at the time of the attack.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Specialist officers are supporting the families of the children who were killed and those who were injured, Chief Constable Kennedy has said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Dave Kitchin, head of service for the North West Ambulance Service in Cheshire and Merseyside, said paramedics encountered a “devastating scene” when they arrived.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He added that ambulances and air ambulances were used to take the 13 victims to Alder Hey Children’s Hospital, Manchester Children’s Hospital, Aintree Hospital, Southport & Formby Hospital and Ormskirk Hospital.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Alder Hey declared a “major incident”, saying its emergency department was “currently extremely busy” and urged parents to only bring their children to the department if it was urgent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Meanwhile, firefighters arrived at the scene of the stabbings to provide trauma care, administer first aid and carry out a search for other people who may have been caught up in the attack.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Two children have been killed and nine others are injured after a knife attack in Southport, north of Liverpool, this morning. Warning: This article contains descriptions some readers may find distressing. All of the nine children who were injured were stabbed and six are in a critical condition. Two adults are also in a critical […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":43445,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_post_source_name":"","_post_source_url":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[461,12],"tags":[6850,5497,5304,9330,11500,287,10552,6738,6825,11111,11525,10197,9515,10864,197,11252,9108,5142,5382,7968,7964,4141,421,12325,3927,6736,9271,11419,5470,6265,11325,1217,11089,12605,3080,9539,1254,594,10265],"class_list":["post-43444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-breaking-news","category-world-news","tag-aid","tag-ambulance","tag-attack","tag-banks","tag-cardiff","tag-children","tag-dance","tag-families","tag-hospital","tag-injured","tag-injuries","tag-investigation","tag-killed","tag-knife","tag-liverpool","tag-manchester","tag-merseyside","tag-merseyside-police","tag-murder","tag-nine","tag-north","tag-north-west","tag-police","tag-primary-school","tag-queen","tag-school","tag-sky","tag-southport","tag-space","tag-stabbing","tag-street","tag-taylor-swift","tag-terror","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-victims","tag-wales","tag-who","tag-yoga"],"blocksy_meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43444","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43444"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43444\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43446,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43444\/revisions\/43446"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43445"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nsemgh.com\/api-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"](\"https:\/\/e3.365dm.com\/24\/07\/768x432\/skynews-southport-stabbings_6642413.jpg?20240729195810\")
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