58 children evacuated after man enters kindergarten with knife in Budapest
A major police operation unfolded in Budapest’s 15th district on Friday afternoon after a 41-year-old man armed with a knife entered the playground of a local kindergarten. Thanks to rapid coordination between the Budapest Police Headquarters (BRFK) and Hungary’s Counter-Terrorism Centre (TEK), all 58 children and 13 staff members were safely evacuated without injury.
71 people evacuated from the kindergarten successfully
According to police reports, authorities received information earlier in the day about a man carrying a knife in the neighbourhood. After locating him around 12:30 PM, officers saw the suspect enter the yard of the Forrás Reformed Kindergarten. The area was immediately secured, and TEK’s special operations units were deployed to the scene.
In what police described as a carefully executed rescue action, children were removed from the building and escorted to a nearby church for safety. In some cases,
officers reportedly passed children out through windows to ensure the evacuation proceeded as quickly and calmly as possible.
Officials stressed that despite the alarming situation, the children were not in immediate danger, and no one was harmed during the incident.
The suspect cooperated after being talked to
Meanwhile, a TEK negotiator engaged in dialogue with the armed man. After ongoing communication, the suspect cooperated, put down the knife and surrendered to the responding units. He was handcuffed on-site and taken into police custody for questioning.
Authorities have not yet disclosed further details about the man, his motives, or his condition at the time of the incident. His formal interrogation and legal assessment are currently underway.
The BRFK commended the swift actions of the officers and TEK personnel, noting that their cooperation ensured a peaceful resolution to a scenario that could have developed far more dangerously.
What a lovely play area that place has. At that age, my own youngest daughter loved ‘monkey bars’…uneven parallel bars made of thick stainless steel tubes between legs of 8x8s one below the other by some distance…so that she could do spins around the one bar or do S shaped in out winding of her body repeatedly. The row of bars way up high between posts she could walk across by hanging with her hands…showing off to other kids how strong she was as a ‘farm’ kid now living in a large town. Kindergarten like other grades should never include violence. Dispicable losers in our modermodern world ignore such basic respectful ideals.