A busy Westfield shopping centre has been plunged into lockdown following reports of an armed offender in the vicinity.
Westfield Marion in Adelaide, South , was evacuated after an armed offender was spotted in the David Jones store.
Video circulating on social media shows heavily armed police officers storming into the centre as sirens can be heard going off and shoppers flee from the centre.
A photo from the scene shows a billboard warning: ‘Armed Offender: Escape, Hide, Tell’.
Paramedics on the scene are treating a women in her 70s with a shoulder injury and a person in their 30s with a knee injury for non life-threatening injuries.
Paramedics on the scene are treating two people for non life-threatening injuries (pictured, non-injured evacuees)
One of the patients has been transferred to the Flinders medical Centre.
Police has asked the public to stay away from the area.
‘Police are aware of an incident occurring at Westfield Marion Shopping Centre,’ a spokesman said.
‘Numerous police patrols are in attendance.
‘At this point in time, police advise the public to stay away from the area.’
Authorities have now erected fences around the shopping centre.
Other footage from the centre posted to social media shows people locked down and waiting in the Target staffroom.
People who were inside the shopping centre at the time of the evacuation posted about the experience online.
Numerous stores, including Woolworths and Rebel Sport, immediately shuttered their doors on the alert to keep shoppers safe.
Chloe Andrews posted to social media from inside a locked up Kmart stock room.
‘I came to Marion to buy a new bin, and it’s ended with myself and like 200 other people in Kmart’s stock room as there is someone armed with a weapon in Marion,’ she said.
‘So anyone thinking of heading this way…just don’t. I’m petrified.’
Numerous stores, including Woolworths and Rebel Sport, immediately shuttered their doors on the alert to keep shoppers safe
One shopper, writing to social media, said the scene turned into ‘absolute bedlam’ after the alert sounded.
‘The alert was so quiet and took until the 3rd one to realise,’ she said.
‘We were in the movies with the two kids and it wasn’t until the third one she said weapon David Jones and so shook up.
‘We ran out the fire escape as one of the first from the whole cinemas and were left to find an escape. Just opening doors to find which one gets to the carport.’
Another shopper claimed the incident had unfolded on the second floor of the store and saw a security guard run up the escalator from level one.
‘The staff were great but people were certainly panicked and running to all the exits,’ they said.
A third had also been shopping in David Jones when they heard a voice over the speaker system announce ‘this in an emergency’.
‘Then we heard it again and we’ve never heard that type of thing, next minute the David Jones security doors went down,’ they told 9News.
Movies being shown in a nearby cinema were immediately stopped and the patrons evacuated.
One woman told the ABC: ‘We were in the movies watching a movie and we just heard … something saying “emergency” for 10 minutes and nobody really knew what it was, if it was a phone or something.
‘[Then] someone went out of the movies at all of a sudden everyone just came running in a just sprinting incoming yelling “run, run!” And we … started sprinting towards the emergency exit.
‘We hid behind the seats. We had no idea it was a drill or something was happening.’
Another shopper, Wendy, told the publication that she was in Woolworths when the store’s shutters closed after the first emergency announcement.
‘It was all pretty fast, the shutters came down really quickly, I didn’t even realise they were coming down because I was at the check-out and next thing I look up and the whole store was shut,’ she said.
Westfield Marion is owned by Scentre Group, same company that runs Westfield Bondi, the scene of a horrific mass murder event in April.
The company has been contacted for a response to the unfolding incident.
Westfield Marion is a major shopping hub in the city’s southern suburbs, about 12km from the CBD.
It is one of South ‘s largest shopping centres and it contains more than 340 stores.
Police conducted an active armed offender training drill at the centre in mid June.
Assistant Commissioner Scott Duval will address media at 5.30pm at Marion Shopping Centre to provide an update on the incident.
More to come.