Firsthand Accounts Frame Terrifying Moments Before, During & After France Attack

Follow CBSMIAMI.COM: Facebook | Twitter

NICE, France (CBSMiami) – We're starting to hear more firsthand accounts of the terrifying moments Thursday night when a large truck entered a pedestrian area in Nice, France and mowed down dozens of revelers.

Nader El Shafei captured the moments just before the attack when he saw the driver swerve in his direction.

"I started to shout at him, 'Stop, stop! There's a lot of people already killed or injured.' And he lifted the wheel like moving in a nervous way and he took something like a cellphone. All this time we thought it was an accident and he was trying to call an ambulance," he said.

Chaos and confusion stretched for more than a mile along the Nice waterfront.

Photographer Antoine Chauvel heard screams through his apartment window.

"Just people, bodies everywhere, people were trying to save their loved ones," he said. "We were seeing people pass away because there was no time there was nothing anyone could do."

Kayla Repan, from Boca Raton, was also there with her fiancé when they heard the loud noise they thought were fireworks. The coupl got caught in a crush of people, running for their lives.

"We just booked it. I grabbed my fiancé and we started running. We're not locals so we really didn't know where we were going," she said. "We were going towards something and it seemed like everyone was running, we were away from something. We were just turning down alleys and kind of looking for somewhere that might be safe."

They ran into a restaurant to take cover. It was a night of terror that will stay with her forever.

"I'm still shaken. It felt like in the moment there was so much shock. And I guess we're still in shock a little bit," he said.

Another American, Grace Ann Murrow, took video as she fled the scene.

"Running, I mean just hauling butt, you know. Women with their children on their arms like this just running and you just kind of can't help but run with them even though you have no idea what you're running from," she said.

One witness said it was only much, much later that she learned what she'd been running from.