Bob Mackin
Vehicle ramming attacks are on the rise, warned the former police chief who is leading City of Vancouver’s FIFA World Cup 26 security planning.
“Vehicle ramming attacks can target crowds assembling in certain locations or queues by attempting to drive through them and to strike as many pedestrians as possible,” said the July 2024 affidavit by Dave Jones of the city’s World Cup secretariat.
The statement, obtained by theBreaker.news under an Information and Privacy Commissioner’s inquiry, was made nine months before a driver killed 11 people with an Audi sport utility vehicle at the April 26 Lapu Lapu Day block party. City hall did not deploy vehicle barriers to protect either end of the Filipino festival’s food truck row on 43rd near Fraser.
“Heavy vehicles, or any other type of vehicle may be used to attack an individual, a crowd, to damage or disrupt operation of infrastructure or safety controls (for instance to weaken or breach a security perimeter) or for vandalism,” Jones explained. “This can result in harm to bystanders and/or the disruptions to the event or to security operations. Vehicles are not difficult to acquire as compared to explosives or other weapons.”
Jones, former head of the New Westminster Police and Metro Vancouver Transit Police, cited a 2017 Edmonton incident when a man truck a police officer with a U-Haul truck outside Commonwealth Stadium during a crime spree. Abdulahi Hasan Sharif was sentenced to 28 years. Since the affidavit, a man killed 14 people in a vehicle ramming attack on New Year’s Day in the New Orleans French Quarter.
Vancouver Police interim chief Steve Rai said the family-oriented Lapu Lapu Day was deemed a low security risk, so no cement barriers, bollards or civic works trucks were deployed.
Adam Kai-ji Lo, 30, was charged with eight counts of second degree murder. More charges are expected. Vancouver Police said the motive was not terrorism.
“We don’t want to cage everybody up at every event in the City of Vancouver,” Rai said. “That’s easy, we can do that like some other places in the world, but it hasn’t been warranted here.”
City dump trucks were set-up on Beatty and Robson streets last December when Taylor Swift ended her Eras Tour at B.C. Place Stadium.
Mayor Ken Sim ordered a full review of event safety measures, “including barriers, traffic control and safety protocols.”
On April 29, B.C. Premier David Eby announced an independent provincial commission on event security measures would report back by June.
“It will be quick turnaround,” Eby told reporters. “Gathering information on best practices from other jurisdictions, understanding from police in Vancouver, across the province and internationally, how best to practically secure events to minimize risk to the public so that people can feel safe and comfortable attending and celebrating with their communities this summer in British Columbia.”
FIFA 26 will be the biggest Vancouver mass-gathering requiring top-level security since the 2010 Winter Olympics, which included concrete barricades, fencing and surveillance cameras.
Vancouver is one of 16 cities hosting FIFA 26 matches across North America. Seven matches are scheduled for B.C. Place Stadium in June and July 2026 and a fan festival on the PNE grounds lasting 39 days.
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