Tours · Marseille · Train station
Courage on the Steps - Gare Saint-Charles
On 1 October 2017, on the forecourt of this great hilltop station at the top of its monumental staircase, a man with a knife killed two young women, cousins aged twenty and twenty-one, before soldiers on the Operation Sentinelle anti-terror patrol stopped him within moments, an attack later treated as terrorism and remembered above all for the troops whose speed prevented far worse.
About this place
Gare Saint-Charles is the gateway to Marseille, a railway station opened in 1848 and set high above the centre, reached from the city below by a grand monumental staircase added in 1925 and decorated with statues and sweeping views. On 1 October 2017 this busy forecourt became the scene of a terrorist attack. A man armed with a knife attacked two young women, cousins aged twenty and twenty-one, who had come to the station, and both were killed. Soldiers patrolling the station as part of Operation Sentinelle, France's standing anti-terror deployment, confronted the attacker and shot him dead within moments as he turned on them. No one else was killed. Prosecutors opened a terrorism investigation, and the attack was later classed as a jihadist act. This stop is told for the two young women whose lives were taken, and for the soldiers whose presence, in the words of one local official, prevented many more deaths. The attacker is not named here, and is given no stage.
Key facts
- 2 victims — Two young women, cousins aged twenty and twenty-one, were killed in the attack at the station.
- 2017 year — The attack took place on 1 October 2017 on the station forecourt, at the top of the monumental staircase.
- 2 shots — Soldiers on the Operation Sentinelle patrol stopped the attacker with two shots within moments of the assault.
📍 Escalier Saint-Charles, 13001, Marseille