Two Americans Foil Shooting Attack On Paris-Bound Train

French emergency services transport a victim after a shooting on the Amsterdam-to-Paris Thalys high-speed train in Arras, France.

Stringer France / Reuters

Two Americans — one of them a member of the U.S. military — helped foil a shooting attack on a Paris-bound train Friday, subduing a gunman who was reportedly armed with a handgun and an automatic rifle, officials said.

One of the Americans was badly injured, French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve told reporters on the scene.

One French police official told the Associated Press that the suspect in the attack did not fire the automatic rifle, but injured one man with his handgun and a second person with a blade.

Cazeneuve commended their efforts as "particularly courageous" and as preventing what could have been a much worse outcome.

"Without them we could have faced a terrible tragedy," he said.

A White House official said President Obama was briefed on the train attack and expressed his "profound gratitude for the courage and quick thinking of several passengers, including U.S. service members who selflessly subdued the attacker."

Bill Urban, a spokesperson for the Secretary of Defense, confirmed to BuzzFeed News that one of the Americans is a member of the U.S. military and sustained "not life-threatening" injuries.

However, Department of Defense officials would not confirm whether the second American was also a member of the military.

French judicial police stand on the train platform near weapon cartridges and a backpack in Arras, France.

Pascal Rossignol / Reuters

The New York Times reported that the suspect, identified only as a 26-year-old man from Morocco, was taken into custody in Arras, where the train stopped after shooting broke out.

More than 550 passengers were reportedly on board the high-speed train, which was headed from Amsterdam to Paris.

According to the Times, the Americans heard the armed suspect loading a weapon in one of the train's bathrooms and confronted him when he walked out while the train was in Belgian territory.

Belgium Prime Minister Charles Michel referred to the violent incident as a terror attack, although it was not immediately clear why or what the motivation of the suspect was.

The Associated Press reported that officials from France's anti-terror police unit were leading the investigation into the shooting.

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