During the early morning hours on New Year’s Day, a police vehicle was parked at an intersection to block access to Bourbon Street in the French Quarter, where the attack took place, but the suspect drove around the car and onto the sidewalk, police said.Police have named Shamsud-Din Jabbar, a 42-year-old Texas resident and US Army veteran, as the suspect. He died in the attack.New Orleans Police Chief Anne Kirkpatrick said on Wednesday that police had been “aware of the bollard situation” and took steps to “harden those target areas”.”We did indeed have a plan, but the terrorist defeated it,” she said.Ms Kirkpatrick said the city planned to take a number of steps to increase security at the Sugar Bowl American football game, which was moved from Wednesday to Thursday afternoon because of the attack.Bourbon Street will be re-opened on Thursday shortly ahead of the game.”We have re-enforced the area,” Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry said on Thursday.

New Orleans began placing bollards on Bourbon Street over ten years ago, Mayor LaToya Cantrell said on Wednesday.But, she added, the bollards began to malfunction because of clogs from Mardi Gras beads, leading officials to try to replace them before the Super Bowl, which is scheduled to take place at the Caesars Superdome, near the site of the attack.At the news conference, Ms Kirkpatrick defended the other security measures the city had in place.”We did have a car there, we had barriers there, we had officers there, and they still got around,” she said.A number of cities in the US and around the world have installed bollards to prevent attacks.New York City put the security measures in place along the Hudson River Park bike path after a man drove a rented pick-up truck into cyclists and runners along the path, killing eight people, in 2017.It’s too difficult to say for certain whether the New Orleans bollards being in place would have prevented such an incident, said University of Michigan professor and counterterrorism expert Javed Ali.”He had a Ford 150 pick-up truck. You gun that thing at 50, 60 miles an hour, and who knows, even with bollards in place, would the car just – through physics – have rammed through them anyways?” he said.”There must have been a lot of luck involved,” Mr Ali added. “That’s unfortunately what happens in these types of attacks.”A 2017 report commissioned by the city of New Orleans found the French Quarter was a “risk and target area for terrorism that the FBI has identified as a concern that the city must address”.The report noted that the neighbourhood was “often densely packed with pedestrians and represents an area where a mass casualty incident could occur”.

Shamsud-Din Jabbar, a 42-year-old US citizen, is believed to have driven a pick-up truck into a crowd on a busy New Orleans street, before exiting the vehicle and firing a weapon. He was shot dead by police at the scene.

The FBI says an Islamic State (IS) group flag was found inside the vehicle he was driving, while two improvised explosive devices were found nearby.

FBI assistant special agent Alethea Duncan said the agency did not believe Jabbar was “solely responsible” and were investigating the incident as an “act of terrorism”.

President Joe Biden said investigators were looking into whether the incident was linked to the explosion of a Tesla Cybertruck outside Trump Hotel in Las Vegas, but “thus far, there is nothing to report”.

The FBI also said it was investigating whether the Las Vegas incident might be an act of terrorism, but has not confirmed the identity of the driver. Authorities said that they had so far found no evidence that this incident was related to IS.

Sheriff Kevin McMahill told a news conference on Wednesday that police were considering whether it may be related to President-elect Donald Trump, who owns the hotel, or Elon Musk, who owns Tesla.

In the wake of the attack in New Orleans, Coroner Dr Dwight McKenna confirmed by the evening that the death toll had risen to 15.

He said it would take several days to perform all of the post-mortem examinations, after which the identities of the victims would be formally released.

Among those killed was former Princeton University football star Martin “Tiger” Bech, according to the college’s athletics department.

“There was no more appropriate nickname of a Princeton player I coached,” Bob Surace, head football coach, said in a statement.

“He was a ‘Tiger’ in every way – a ferocious competitor with endless energy, a beloved teammate and a caring friend.

“Dozens of others were injured during the attack, which took place in New Orleans’ French Quarter – a bustling nightspot popular with locals and tourists – at around 03:15 (09:15 GMT).

“This man was trying to run over as many people as he possibly could”, New Orleans Police Chief Anne Kirkpatrick said.

A long gun with a “suppressive device” on it – acting as a silencer – was also recovered from the scene. The pick-up truck he was driving is believed to have been rented in Texas via an app.Jabbar was born in Texas and previously served in the US Army.

According to a now-removed LinkedIn profile, he had worked in various roles in the US Army, including in human resources and IT, before he was discharged.

He studied at George State University from 2015 to 2017, graduating with a degree in computer information systems.

He also appears to have worked in real estate, holding a license that expired in 2021. He had a criminal record, relating to traffic offences and theft.

Video shows the truck driving onto the pavement to get around a police car before hitting people.

The city’s system of bollards – short, vertical posts to block vehicle access to pedestrian streets – was in the process of being repaired, the vice president of the New Orleans City Council told the BBC’s Newsday programme.

That meant temporary barricades were in place, CBS News reported.

Witnesses who had been in New Orleans’ French Quarter for New Year celebrations have spoken of the carnage they witnessed.

Whit Davis, from Shreveport, Louisiana, was in a bar with friends on Bourbon Street when the attack took place.

“People started running and getting under tables like it was an active shooter drill,” he told the BBC. “Everyone was just completely in shock.”

Jim and Nicole Mowrer, who were visiting New Orleans from Iowa, told CBS News that they witnessed the truck drive through a barricade at speed then heard gunshots and crashing noises.

They tried to help people they thought were wounded but realised the victims had died.

A hotel worker told CBS he had been closing down for the evening when he looked out the window and noticed “there was a lot of bodies lying on the ground”.

“The truck was speeding away. I immediately ran downstairs to see if there were some people I can help out and unfortunately some people did perish during that event.”

“The scene was just horrific,” he added.

US President Joe Biden said his reaction to the attack was one of “anger and frustration”.

The White House said Mr Biden had called the city’s mayor this morning to offer “full federal support”.

Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry said in a post on X that he was “praying for all the victims and first responders on scene”.

“A horrific act of violence took place on Bourbon Street earlier this morning,” Landry wrote.

The Sugar Bowl, a much-anticipated college football match between Notre Dame and the University of Georgia, has been postponed until Thursday as a result of the attack.