A visual timeline of the New Year’s attack that left at least 14 dead in New Orleans

By Caroll Alvarado, Elizabeth Wolfe and Avery Schmitz, CNN

New Orleans’ famed Bourbon Street devolved into a grisly crime scene just hours into the new year as a driver plowed a three-ton pickup through crowds of holiday revelers, killing at least 14 people and injuring dozens of others in what the FBI is investigating as an act of terrorism.

The attacker, Shamsud-Din Jabbar, was killed in a shootout with police, authorities said.

“He was hell-bent on creating the carnage and the damage that he did,” New Orleans Police Superintendent Anne Kirkpatrick said.

Using surveillance footage and witness video and accounts, CNN has pieced together a visual timeline of the attack.

Around 10:02 p.m. Tuesday, Jabbar unloaded his rented truck outside an Airbnb rental home in New Orleans’ St. Roch neighborhood, Ring camera footage shared by neighborhood resident Michael Adasko shows. Adasko, who lives next to the home Jabbar rented, said he believes Jabbar checked into the rental home around that time.

“I only saw them (the attacker) that one night. I believe he checked in at 10 p.m.,” Adasko said.

By early Wednesday, Jabbar was walking the streets of New Orleans’ French Quarter between 1 a.m. and 2 a.m. and planting at least two improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, authorities have said, citing surveillance footage.

Two surveillance images, released after the attack by the FBI, show Jabbar walking along Dauphine Street near Governor Nicholls Street at around 2 a.m. in a long, tan coat and jeans, according to the federal bureau. That intersection is about a block from Bourbon Street.

Another image released by the FBI shows a blue cooler that the bureau said Jabbar placed near Bourbon and Orleans streets. That cooler, and another that Jabbar placed two blocks away, contained IEDs, the FBI said.

Those devices are not reported to have exploded during the attack that followed.

Around 3:16 a.m. Wednesday, a white pickup truck was captured on a surveillance camera driving northwest on Canal Street toward the intersection with Bourbon Street.

At the intersection, the truck makes a sharp right onto the sidewalk, around a police car blocking traffic from entering Bourbon Street, and plowing into a group of people who had been standing on the corner.

Panic and fear surged through the crowd as the driver accelerated down Bourbon Street, ramming into more pedestrians.

“The guy in the pickup truck just punched the gas and mowed over the barricade and hit pedicab passengers,” Kimberly Stricklin, a visitor from Alabama, told CNN affiliate WDSU. “There were just bodies and the screams. You can’t unhear that,” Stricklin told CNN affiliate WDSU.

Kevin Garcia, 22, was horrified to see the truck “slamming into everyone on the left side of Bourbon sidewalk,” he told CNN shortly after the incident.

“A body came flying at me,” Garcia recalled.

People raced for cover in nearby venues. One group of women pushed past a nightclub’s security guards and scrambled to hide underneath tables, said Jimmy Cothran, who was inside the club.

A few blocks away, a group of police officers jumped into action after appearing to receive an emergency call, video shows. The officers sprinted down the street, pushing through wandering partygoers in their hurry.

The truck continued racing down Bourbon Street before crashing, police said.

The attacker exited his car and began shooting at police officers, who returned fire, according to the FBI. The attacker was shot and killed by officers, police said. Two officers were injured and were in stable condition Wednesday.

Social media video verified by CNN appears to capture the confrontation between police and the attacker outside the Royal Sonesta New Orleans hotel – about two blocks from where the truck began its deadly path. The video, geolocated by CNN, shows an injured person lying just feet from a heavily damaged white pickup truck.

Bystanders rush toward the victim as two uniformed law enforcement officers appear to confront the vehicle’s driver, the video shows. Seconds later, a series of gunshots ring out. The officers recoil and quickly retreat from the truck as onlookers flee.

Some patrons of a nearby bar came into the street to see what had caused the commotion, video shows. But as bullets began flying, they panicked and fled back inside, taking shelter in the bar’s restrooms.

The video appears to show at least one pedestrian being knocked to the ground by gunfire.

The street resembled a “real-life horror movie” with crumpled bodies strewn across the bloody asphalt, said Cothran, one of the witnesses. After the truck passed, Cothran stepped onto a nightclub balcony to find “unimaginable casualty” below.

Cothran and a friend counted around eight bodies, including that of a “crushed” man with tire tracks stamped on his body. A young woman, whom he had seen dancing in the street, now lay lifeless and “completely flat in the middle.”

A woman can been seen weeping over a body that lies in the street in video captured from a balcony above. Law enforcement officers run past the woman, passing several more bodies down the street.

Around 3:30 a.m., a witness captured video and photos of law enforcement running toward the attacker’s truck and working to secure the scene.

Inside the truck, investigators found an ISIS flag and what they initially said were potential IEDs. Eventually, the FBI would say only the two coolers that had been placed in the French Quarter had functional IEDs, and both were rendered safe by authorities. Reports of other devices “turned out to be misinformation or not actual functioning devices,” FBI Deputy Assistant Director Christopher Raia said.

Law enforcement flooded the area. By 3:40 a.m., surrounding streets were packed with law enforcement vehicles that blocked access to the crime scene, video from a witness shows.

Many people huddled inside clubs and bars as investigators worked to secure the scene. Whit Davis, a 22-year-old from Shreveport, Louisiana, was in a club when the attack happened.

“We basically went into lockdown for a little bit and then it calmed down, but (police) wouldn’t let us leave,” Davis said.

“When they finally let us out of the club, police waved us where to walk and were telling us to get out of the area fast. I saw a few dead bodies they couldn’t even cover up and tons of people receiving first aid,” Davis told CNN.

Questions still outweigh answers in the case and New Orleans residents have barely begun to pick up the pieces after the tragic attack. But Kirkpatrick, the police superintendent, reassured the community that it is is strong enough to overcome this devastating blow.

“This city has been tried by fire before, but fire purifies. Fire makes things stronger,” Kirkpatrick said. “There is a path forward.”

CNN’s Annette Choi, David Williams, Sara Smart, Avery Schmitz, Aaron Fisher, Frank Fenimore, Evan Perez, Priscilla Alvarez, Holmes Lybrand, Josh Campbell, Isaac Yee, Jessie Yeung, Chris Boyette and Tori Powell contributed to this report.

UPDATE: An earlier version of this story included the attacker in the number of people killed. At least 14 people were killed. The attacker is also dead.

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