I was at Liverpool trophy parade when car hit fans - the city erupted in screams

What should have been city's day of celebration ended in horror on Monday evening after a car ploughed into Liverpool fans celebrating winning the Premier League. Just 10 minutes after the team bus packed with Anfield's stars had driven past the junction of Water Street and The Strand - right opposite the famous Liver Building - the city erupted in screams.

As fans walked up Water Street away from the parade, a blue saloon car started hitting pedestrians as other people leapt out of the way. Have-a-go heroes started smashing the rear windscreen to stop the vehicle before police and armed officers swooped, hauled a white middle-aged man out and arrested him.

Within seconds as passersby ran over to help a number of fans injured on the floor, fleets of North West Ambulance Service paramedics leapt into action.

It is estimated up to one million supporters had headed to the city centre from the morning onwards to see the open top bus parade and their sporting heroes.

One family told the Express how they had been at that spot just seconds earlier bit moves away as they began to work out how they could head home.

The family, who asked not to be named, said: "We were there just seconds earlier and had just left Water Street and moved onto Dale Street where we are taking now.

"The flow of people walking the same direction was huge and thick with happy families and kids and supporters. We had been having a wonderful day. We were so pleased to see the team bus.

"But it seems the car then headed the opposite way, against the flow of the fans, and onto them. It's awful."

The Daily Express arrived at the scene by 8pm and as we drove into the city centre there was a flood of families in red Liverpool scarves, hats and shirts heading the other way home.

But the closer we got to the city centre all you could hear were the wail of sirens as police blocked off roads, tried to usher as many people out of the centre as possible and ambulances with flashing lights zoomed in and out of the scene.

Eyewitness Les Winsper, 55, and pal Craig Steward, 52, said they believed the driver put his foot down after panicking when people tried to get him out of his car before the incident - as he drove down a packed road and may have earlier bumped into a pedestrian.

Les told us: "I think what happened he was trying to get down the street and he dipped someone (hit them) and the crowd reacted and tried to open his doors and get him to stop and he panicked and ploughed through the crowd.

"The first person he hit must have gone 20ft into the air. The driver was obviously just panicking. I could see him put his foot down as far as it could go.

"I have never seen anything like it. People were shouting and kids were crying it was an awful scene."

Craig Steward said: "It was awful. The driver just ploughed through the crown in a state of panic because people were trying to get him out of the car.

"People could not believe he was trying to drive his car down a crowded street because there were hundreds of people.

"The whole thing lasted 20 seconds and people did not know what was going on.

"It could have been some sort of terrorist thing. But I think the driver just reacted in a panic when people tried to get him out of the car.

"It was shocking. But I do not know why the police had not closed the road off as there were so many people there."