Ambulance crew attacked with axes and stones in Cluj after TikTok child-kidnapping rumor

The incident

An ambulance crew from the Cluj County Ambulance Service was dispatched on Saturday 8 August after 21:00 to Recea Cristur, a village roughly 30 kilometres away, to assist a patient reporting feeling unwell. When the crew stopped at the village entrance to ask a group of locals for directions, the residents began filming the vehicle and acting agitated rather than helping. The locals' reaction was linked to rumors circulating on TikTok about a supposed black ambulance that comes to villages to kidnap children, according to Dejeanul.ro.

The assault

The crew continued to the patient, picked him up, and set off toward the hospital in Dej. On the way, a car blocked the ambulance's path. Three or four people stepped out armed with clubs and axes and began striking the vehicle. They continued beating the ambulance and threw stones, one of which shattered the window next to the driver. Glass shards hit the driver's eye, causing a corneal injury.

A member of the crew described the attack to the press.

“They got out of the car with poles, with axes. There were three or four people. Only the ambulance driver's presence of mind prevented there from being victims. They hit the ambulance with the poles, with the axes. One of them threw a stone, breaking the driver's window. Our colleague the ambulance driver is injured.”

Escape and medical care

Despite his injury, the driver maintained control of the vehicle and drove the ambulance to Cluj-Napoca. The crew called the emergency number 112 and requested police assistance, but no police unit was dispatched to help them. Once in Cluj-Napoca, the driver was admitted to hospital and taken urgently to the operating room. The glass shards had damaged his cornea, and doctors estimated he would need at least 3 months to recover.

The TikTok rumor

The attack was directly motivated by a viral rumor on TikTok about a black ambulance allegedly traveling to rural communities to abduct children. When the crew stopped in Recea Cristur to ask for the address they had been called to, locals recognized the ambulance through the lens of that rumor and responded with hostility, filming the vehicle before the situation escalated to physical violence. The patient the crew had been sent to help was ultimately picked up and was in the ambulance during the attack.