A large police operation has unfolded at a juvenile detention centre on the New South Wales Central Coast after inmates managed to break out of their cells using chainsaws.
According to news.com.au, as many as eight young people have been stabbed during the riot at the Frank Baxter Correctional Centre at Kariong.
Local media is reporting a group of inmates managed to get keys to a maintenance shed where they stole a bunch of chainsaws, which they used to break others out of their cells.
The Sydney Morning Herald adds that inmates used other tools found in the maintenance shed, like a whipper snipper, to attack other inmates, including those convicted of sex offences.
Around 10 inmates managed to get onto the roof, where they taunted police below. It's understood several have now surrendered themselves to authorities.
More than a dozen ambulances, firefighters and police units have descended on the area and they're hoping to bring the siege to an end as soon as possible.
A police spokesperson said: "Police are currently investigating an incident at a juvenile justice centre in Kariong. Emergency services were called to the centre after reports of a disturbance.
"They have established a perimeter and are monitoring the (ongoing) situation."
Staff at the facility told SMH that they were fearful of their safety and weren't able to stop the riot until police arrived.
The Kariong facility is the largest juvenile detention centre in New South Wales and houses inmates between the ages of 16 and 21. It can hold up to 120 inmates at any given time.
It's certainly no stranger to issues with inmates in the past, with violent attacks on staff nearly tripling from 2017 to 2018 and prisoner self-harm incidents nearly doubling from 52 to 100.
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