Two men found dead after apparent shooting at Hamburg factory site

Two men were found dead at a factory site in Hamburg's St. Pauli district late Tuesday after witnesses reported hearing gunfire, police said.

Emergency services were called to Lagerstrasse, near Sternschanze railway station, and several patrol cars were sent to the scene. The two men were found at the site and died there from their injuries, a police operations center spokesman said.

Police launched a search involving more than two dozen patrol cars. The immediate circumstances were unclear, but homicide investigators said the victims and the attacker appear to have known each other.

The location is on the edge of the St. Pauli quarter, not far from the nightlife district around the Reeperbahn, but the factory and warehouse strip on Lagerstrasse is a more industrial pocket near the Sternschanze station. The area has seen residential and commercial development in recent years, and the killings have brought a visible police presence to the streets overnight.

A police spokesman said there was no danger to local residents.