Two women were stabbed inside New York City’s famous Museum of Modern Art on Saturday afternoon, according to police.
They were both taken to Bellevue Hospital and are in stable condition.
The two victims are likely employees stabbed by a former colleague, ABC 13 reports, citing unnamed sources.
The attack took place around 4:15pm. A security guard reportedly tried to stop the assailant but was unsuccessful.
Police are still searching for a suspect, who fled the museum and attempted to enter a nearby Episcopal church.
The individual was described by police as a white man, who was seen wearing a dark jacket, blue face mask, and sunglasses.
Photographers captured two women being carried out of the Midtown Manhattan museum on stretchers by medics.
One of the victims joked, “I’m going to get hazard pay!” to a passing New York Post reporter.
Officers have asked members of the public to stay away from the area surrounding the museum on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth avenues.
Witnesses described a chaotic “stampede” at the museum when news of the stabbing arrived.
Someone yelled out, “Shooting!” as crowds of people rushed the doors to exit the MoMa.
“We were really scared,” Julia Garcia Valles, a Spanish tourist, told The New York Times.
Multiple attendees heard rumours or announcements there was a shooting inside the building, even though no shooting occurred.
“I was watching Picasso and Cézanne and suddenly they said, ‘The Museum is closed,’ and people started running. A little panic on the escalators. Then they started shouting, ‘Get out, get out for your own safety!’” another man told the New York Daily News.
Bystanders saw someone stabbed in the underarm area, reporter Alyssa Katz, deputy editor of the news site THE CITY, wrote on Twitter on Saturday.
Guests inside the museum were evacuated following the stabbing, according to witnesses.
Police and museum staff were seen pulling closed curtains along the large glass windows at the front of the museum entrance.
New York mayor Eric Adams has been briefed on the incident.
