Video: Dramatic Shootout in Front of East St. Louis Gas Station

Warning: Footage may be distressing to some viewers

Police in East St. Louis, Illinois, are searching for suspects involved in a dramatic shootout in front of a gas station.

The shootout took place at around 1 a.m. on Sept. 12 at the Gas Mart on 18th and Missouri, KMOV reported.

Two cars pulled in front of the gas station. Police said the driver of a black car fired the first shot at a person inside the red car before the two started firing at one another.

Surveillance video shows customers ducking for cover inside the gas station.

“It’s horrific,” customer Lamar Rodgers said, according to KRON4. “You know, I could have been in there buying a soda for my daughter or son and this is going on outside, and you don’t even know it.”

“It could have been anyone. Thank God no one was injured or killed,” said Detective Ronald McClellan of East St. Louis Police, according to the report.

He said that the people who shot at one another knew each other, but officials are not sure what prompted the shootout.

According to Fox2, the business likely suffered several thousand dollars in damage due to the shooting.

“One of them had a semi-automatic handgun, the other, it appeared to be an assault rifle-style pistol,” said McClellan in the Fox2 report.

He added that the suspects are local men who are known to police, adding that they are both felons with an extensive criminal history.

Police have said they are seeing more criminals who have no regard for where they open fire.

“Wherever they see the person at, that’s where they want to have shootouts,“ McClellan said, KRON reported. ”It’s putting the general public at risk.”