The 2018 Toronto Van Attack: Understanding the Disaster by Looking at Vulnerability, Tactics, and Motives
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.25071/g87bdy24Keywords:
Toronto Van Attack, Mass Murder, Ideological Motivated Extremism, Vehicular Ramming Attacks, Gender-Driven Violence, Terrorism, Soft TargetsAbstract
On April 23, 2018, an attacker drove a van along Toronto’s Yonge Street and its sidewalks, purposely colliding with pedestrians. Ten persons were killed, and 16 were injured. Emergency managers in Canada’s urban centres will occasionally face socially mediated disasters originating from anti-social actions taken by ideologically motivated, violent extremists. The Toronto Van attack was a disturbing rapid sequence mass murder, which was especially depraved due to its sheer levels of violence and specific targeting of women. In an attempt to comprehend the disaster, this paper explores issues of vulnerability, tactics, and motives related to the vehicular ramming attack. It is suggested that the pervasive threat of gender-driven violence needs to be recognized, crime prevention through environmental design and counter terrorism-based soft target hardening strategies can work to reduce risks, failure of imagination leading to disregard of criminal and terrorist threats should be avoided, and any security measures to defend pedestrians should be commensurate with the actual risk present.
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