Cumbria - (Big Bang Theories): A massive manhunt is under way after 52 year-old Rowrah cabbie Derrick Bird went on a Hungerford-style shooting rampage.
The incident has temporarily knocked Bradford Ripper and self-declared 'Crossbow Cannibal' off the nation's number one slot of gruesome headlines register.
Lake Disctrict police have reported several fatalities in the Whitehaven, Seascale and Egremont districts where a 'crazy guy' with a shotgun went beserk at lunchtime.
Today's carnage is horribly reminiscent of the 1987 Hungerford massacre where 27-year-old Michael Robert Ryan fatally mowed down sixteen people including his mother and seriously wounded another fifteen before finally shooting himself.
Initial reports today said the first Cumbria victim was gunned down at a taxi rank where Bird had been known to ply his trade.
"This is not - I repeat not - a trivial fare-dodger incident," Whitehaven Cabbies Association sources commented.
