An attacker drove a vehicle into a number of people on the Westminster Bridge, before the car crashed outside the Houses of Parliament. 

The man got out of the vehicle and ran through the parliament gates, before stabbing an unarmed police officer.

He was shot by police and has since died from his injuries.

As of Thursday afternoon, Australian time, five people had died from the attacker’s actions.

Ms Bourke, a Fairfax Media journalist based in London, was at the Houses of Parliament when the terror attack occurred. 

“A whole bunch of foreign media were invited this morning, to get to know how parliament works,” she said.

“What was learnt was very different indeed.

“It [the attack] flashed up on our phones when we were in a meeting with the Lord [Mayor of London]. The whole meeting, obviously, went into a kerfuffle.

“We were told not to leave the building; it went into lockdown. Forty minutes later we were ushered through the building to a courtyard, in a group that included peers, visitors, students, everyone in the building.

“It was very intense. There was many more armed police in and around the building [Houses of Parliament] than normal.”

Ms Bourke spoke to one witness who saw the “carnage” on Westminster Bridge unfold.

“He told me he saw a body fall from the bridge, into the River Thames,” she said. 

The mood was described by Ms Bourke as defiant and stoic, one she said could be called “fairly British”. 

She also said police were applauded for their work.

Ms Bourke was interviewed on the Today Show, on Thursday morning, which was witnessed by her brother back in Australia. 

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull revealed an Australian permanent resident, who lives in South Australia, was amongst one of the injured. 

The terror attack was the first major attack to occur in the British capital since the London bombings in 2005.