Six people were killed and at least 30 others were hospitalized after a shooting on a street where a Fourth of July parade was being held in Highland Park, a suburb of Chicago.

Witnesses said they saw bloodied bodies covered in blankets, while hundreds of people ran to escape danger.

The Chicago Sun-Times reported that the parade began around 10 a.m., but was abruptly cut short after just 10 minutes, after gunfire began.

Hundreds of marchers, some visibly bloodied, fled the parade route, leaving behind chairs, strollers and blankets.

Police urged people to leave, warning that the area was not safe.

In a video shot by a reporter for The Chicago Sun-Times after the shooting began, a band is shown playing music on a mobile platform while people run screaming. A photo posted on social media shows pools of blood under overturned chairs in Highland Park.

Gina Troiani and her son were lining up with kindergarteners to walk along the parade route when she heard a loud noise. She thought they were fireworks, until she heard people shouting that there was an armed attacker.

“We just started running in the opposite direction,” she told the Associated Press news agency.

Her 5-year-old son was giving her his bicycle decorated with red and blue stripes. He and the other children in the group carried small American flags. Mrs. Troiani said she pushed her son’s bike as they ran through the neighborhood to get back to their car.

In a video that Ms. Troiani filmed with her phone, some of the children, startled by the loud noise, can be seen gathering on one side of the road, while a siren can be heard nearby.

“It was just kind of chaos,” she said.

“There were people who were separated from their families and were looking for them. “Others just dropped the carts with their belongings, grabbed their children and started running,” said Ms. Trojani.

The governor of the state of Illinois, J.B. Pritzker, in a tweet, said he is “closely monitoring the situation in Highland Park” and that Illinois State Police are assisting.

The Lake County Sheriff’s Office said on Twitter that it is assisting Highland Park police with a “shooting in the area of ​​the Independence Day parade route.” The sheriff’s office directed an Associated Press reporter to contact Highland Park police.

The Police Department said no officials were immediately available to discuss the incident.

Debbie Glickman, a resident of Highland Park, said she was in a parade with her colleagues and the group was preparing to return to Main Street when she saw people running from the area.

“People started saying, ‘There’s a shooter, there’s a shooter, there’s a shooter,'” Ms. Glickman told the Associated Press news agency.

“So we just ran. We just ran. It’s like mass chaos down there,” she said.

Ms. Glikman said she did not hear any noise or see anyone who appeared to be injured.

“I’m very scared,” she said.

“It’s very sad”, stressed Mrs. Glikman