Officials probing if New Orleans attack is linked to Las Vegas truck blast

A US Army veteran with an Islamic State flag and "hellbent" on carnage steered a pickup truck into a crowd of New Year revelers in New Orleans on Wednesday, killing at least 15 people and wounding dozens, officials said.

The FBI identified the attacker as Shamsud-Din Jabbar, a 42-year-old US citizen from Texas. He appeared to have been a real estate agent working in Houston and had served as an IT specialist in the military.

Officials said they were searching for accomplices but gave few details. US President Joe Biden, describing the attack as "despicable," said Jabbar had posted videos online hours before "indicating that he was inspired by ISIS."

Biden also said that law enforcement agencies were probing any possible links between the attack and the explosion later on Wednesday of a Tesla Cybertruck outside a hotel owned by US President-elect Donald Trump in Las Vegas that killed one person, though he cautioned that none had been found so far.