Two men have died in a shooting incident at the Mercedes plant in Sindelfingen on Thursday morning, reported Deutsche Welle (DW).
A large-scale emergency operation was underway and a special operations team sealed off the site with a full-scale deployment including two helicopters and several emergency doctors.
The Public Prosecutor's Office in the nearby city of Stuttgart said he thought it was a single perpetrator responsible for the shooting that killed 44-year-old men, according to DW.
It is believed that the shots were fired at a production line team leader, with the arrested suspect being a 53-year-old external worker from a logistics company. The officials said that the staffers overpowered the suspected perpetrator and held him until police arrived.
Many shorts were reportedly fired at about 7:45 am local time. An hour later, police tweeted that an operation involving police and rescue workers were going on at the factory complex, around 15 kilometers southwest of Stuttgart. The authorities have confirmed that a suspect was taken into custody, DW reported.
The emergency services were reported to have carried out a search operation of the building looking for other injured people. The factory employees told DW that the scene was the automaker's Factory 56, where the firm's flagship S-Class vehicle is produced.
A spokesperson said that police are still gathering information and that staffers are being provided with psychological support.
Mercedes-Benz has expressed disappointment over the shooting incident. A company spokesman said that the tragic news from Sindelfingen has deeply shocked us, adding, "Our thoughts are with the victims, their families and all colleagues on site," DW reported.
READ ALSO:
1672397318_80X80.jpg)
1672397318_680.jpg)
