Trafford resident tells of Tunisia horror after terrorist attack

John Clarke was staying in a hotel nearby the scene of the mass shooting in Sousse, where a gunman with links to the Islamic State terrorist group murdered 38 innocent people.

More than 30 Britons are thought to have died in the attack, perpetrated by 23-year-old Seifeddine Rezgui, who was shot dead by Tunisian police following the assault at the Imperial Marhaba hotel.

Sale resident, John Clarke, was staying at a neighbouring hotel and described hearing loud ‘cracks’.

He told the BBC: “Over the loudspeaker there was an announcement telling all the people here to go up towards reception.

“So everybody wondered what was going on. We ambled up towards reception. As we were going towards reception we heard a few more cracks.”

Remembering an attack that killed more than 20 at Tunisia’s Bardo National Museum in March, John added: “Obviously, knowing what has gone on here before, we were all a bit suspicious.

“We got into the lobby and we were told all to go to our hotel rooms and stay in our hotel rooms until further notice.

“When we got up to our hotel room, there was automatic gunfire. A lot of gunfire. Lots of sirens and obviously people were wondering what was going on.

“We’ve all got the BBC World Service in our rooms, so we were watching what was going on, on the TV and the reports were starting to come through.

“We were getting more information off the TV to be honest and when we heard that five were killed; seven were killed I think the panic in the hotel rose a little bit, because we were all sort of looking over our balconies, talking between each other.

“Then we heard that 27 had been killed and then you can see people really starting to get shocked.

“There were helicopters, ambulances, sirens all over the place.

“At one point, a couple of members of the hotel staff came out and told us to get in our rooms and lock the balcony.”

The attack is the biggest loss of British life since the 2005 London bombings.