Survivors tell horror tales of New Zealand’s mosque massacre

Fear gripped New Zealand's Christchurch city as survivors recounted horrifying details of the massacre of 49 people by a right-wing racist gunman while the devotees were offering their Friday prayers in two mosques in the city centre.

The gunman brazenly live streamed his dastardly act on Facebook with a head-strapped camera, such a zealot he was. Facebook has since removed the streaming video.

Witnesses said there were around 400 people in the Al Noor Mosque who ran helter-skelter on hearing gunshots. There were about 100 people in Linwood Avenue Mosque, the second mosque, barely four km away.

One unnamed survivor with blood-soaked clothes said he saw the gunman shoot a man in the chest at the Al Noor Mosque. The witness said that the shooting continued for 20 minutes.

"I prayed desperately for the gunner to run out of bullets," the witness told a reporter of TVNZ.

Ramzan Ali, from Christchurch, told the New Zealand Herald that lunged for the window and jumped out even as fellow Muslims were gunned down next to him in the Al Noor Mosque.

"I saw people running for all the doors. To get 300 people out of two doorways was not easy because the gunman entered through the main door while the two doors on both the sides."

Ali said he hid behind a bench, yet my legs were protruding and thus could be seen by the gunman. "He (the gunman) started shooting 'Bang, bang, bang'."

He said the shooting stopped and restarted seven times as the gunman kept reloading the bullets. "I hoped he ran out bullets."

Ali then managed to dive through an already-broken window and then into Hagley Park. "I was the last person to get out of the mosque alive," he said. "I can only say I was blessed, I was lucky. Allah was looking after me."

Farid Ahmed a senior member of Al Noor mosque in Christchurch explained how the attack unfolded, writes Clea Skopeliti. Speaking to the BBC, he said:

“I was inside the mosque, in the side room and the Imam had started the sermon so everyone was settled, it was very peaceful calm and quiet as usual."

“Then suddenly the shooting started. It started in the main room, so I did not see who was shooting but I saw that people were running out through the room that I was in and I saw that some people had blood on their bodies and were limping."

“At that moment I realised that it was really serious - a couple of people said to me, you’re in a wheelchair, you’ve got to get out now and I pushed myself to the back where my car was parked and I was behind the car."

“From there, I was hearing the shooting, the shooting, the shooting. It went on about six minutes or more."

“I could hear screaming and crying. I saw some people drop dead, some running away. I couldn’t because I was in the wheelchair, and also I didn’t want to - I was afraid of what was going to happen to the ladies, what was going to happen to my wife.”

However, his brother Ashraf wasn't lucky enough to escape from the mosque. He has been missing.

Mohan Ibrahim was also among 400 people praying inside Al Noor Mosque.

"I didn't get a glimpse of the gunman as I was in the next room, but all of a sudden we heard the shots being fired and people just started running for their lives. I'm still in shock.”

"A lot of people have been killed and many are injured. I saw a girl dead in the middle of the road," Ibrahim recounted in tears.

Sophie Nears, 19, told the Herald her friend had called her screaming that he had been shot in the leg .He was hysterical.

"He just hung up. I haven't heard from him since then. He was screaming that heaps of people were dead and then the line just went off."

A 14-year-old high school student in Christchurch said that his uncle was one of the people who got shot. After seeing people falling down, he ran as fast as he could all the way to the nearby Hagley Park.

"The gunshots sounded like pop, pop, pop ... I heard over 50," the boy said. About 110 rounds of shots were fired reports said.

Another man who survived by hiding said people broke through windows to escape.

At the second mosque, Linwood Masjid, survivors said they saw a gunman wearing a black helmet open fire on around 100 people praying inside.

Witness Syed Ahmed told stuff.co.nz the man had been "shouting something" while firing.

Two Indonesians, a father and son, were also among those shot and wounded, Foreign Ministry spokesman Arrmanatha Nasir said.

Nasir said the father is being treated at an intensive care unit and his son is in another ward at the same hospital.

The man's wife, Alta Marie, posted on Facebook that her husband and their son are both alive, but wounded.

Marie said that both were shot in the attack Friday at Christchurch's Linwood Islamic center.

"My husband was shot in multiple places," she wrote on Facebook. She said she was with her son, who is "traumatized" after being shot in his back and leg.

One man, who said he was at the Al Noor mosque, told media the gunman was white, blond and wearing a helmet and a bulletproof vest. The man burst into the mosque as worshippers were kneeling for prayers.

"He had a big gun. He came and started shooting at everyone in the mosque," said Ahmad Al-Mahmoud. He said he and others escaped by breaking through a glass door.

"The firing went on and on. One person with us had a bullet in her arm. When the firing stopped, I looked over the fence, there was one guy, loading his gun."

Daoud Nabi, 71, was the first of the 49 Christchurch victims to be identified. He stood at the door, ready to pray, and welcomed the terrorist inside, "come in brother" were his last words. The grandfather died trying to save someone else from a bullet.