LOS ANGELES, Nov. 26 (Xinhua) -- Several hundred inmates were involved in a riot that occurred in a prison run by the Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry, the authority said on Thursday, adding no staff or inmates were reported to be injured.

File photo: CFP

The department's spokesperson Judy Keane was quoted by the local AZ Central news website as saying that due to several hundred inmates grouped together around staff and refused to disperse since Wednesday, the prison was still on lockdown as of Thursday afternoon.

Local KJZZ radio station said families of inmates at the unit reported pepper balls and rubber bullets were fired at the inmates, the involved inmates were zip-tied and held on a yard while prison officials searched their living areas.

According to KJZZ, emails from inmates living at the unit said windows had been broken on the property and one inmate wrote that the unit looked like it had "exploded."

"They came in with tear gas, flash bangs, pepper spray, and started shooting at everyone," the inmate wrote. "It was basically a war zone."

The authority did not say what may have led to the riot.