Berlin market attack rocks locals' sense of security.

By James Glenday and cameraman Niall Lenihan in Berlin.

There is an all too familiar and tragic routine in the wake of bloody terrorist attacks in Europe.

The bodies are taken away, the blood is washed off the pavement and once the scene is sanitised beautiful makeshift memorials spring up to the dead.

Media outlets from every corner of the globe gather at these haunted places.

Around the clock, they over-analyse what is essentially senseless violence and murder in a largely futile bid to accurately convey just how devastating it must be to have your little patch of the world become the scene of such publicised horror and heartbreak.

So this time, we dispensed with cliched observations about the mood on the ground and simply asked Berliners how they felt.

This is what half a dozen locals told us, 24 hours after a truck ploughed into the picturesque market where they celebrate Christmas with friends and family.

Marvin Schulz

“I’m sad … it was very bad,” he said.

“You could hear [the truck] then you look back and see all the other people are dead and the other people, they screamed.

“I think the families [of] the dead people, they should get very big help, and it’s bad for all of [us] here, all in Germany, all in Berlin.”

Ulrika Grunewald

“Today is a bad day,” she said.

“But I feel safe in Berlin, you can’t lock yourself away and you can’t let this change your life.

“No one can ever guarantee you will be 100 per cent safe.

“Asylum seekers are not to blame for this. It seems like this was just one man.”

Klaus Kampmann

“I love this place. I’ve come to this Christmas market a lot,” he said.

“I didn’t think this would happen here.

“You just don’t think like that or you hope it won’t happen.”

Ulla Kramer

“What can you do?” she asked.

“The question is not, ‘Do I feel safe?’

“I am here in Berlin and I have to [get on with it].

“My daughter lives near Bataclan [the site of the 2015 massacre in Paris] and yesterday she couldn’t reach me.

“[She asked] ‘Are you fine, mummy, are you fine?’ And the same happened to me when she was in Paris.”

Zina, Mattea, Carlotta

“I’m really shocked — I can’t quite comprehend that this happened so close to us,” Zina said.

“I just feel lucky that we weren’t there,” Mattea said.

“We do come here a lot in the evening,” Carlotta said.

Holger Eckhardt

“We hope they can find the killer,” he said.

“In a week I might feel a bit better.

“This is so horrible right now.”

This post originally appeared on ABC News.