Darwin's Don Dale detention centre has been closed indefinitely and its youth detainees placed in a watch house
The disturbance started on Tuesday when two detainees assaulted a youth justice worker. With the attack captured on camera, they stole his keys and released others from their cells.
The Don Dale facility on fire during the riots. Source: Twitter
Northern Territory Families Minister Dale Wakefield and department CEO Ken Davies are due to provide more information about the detainees on Thursday morning.
The rampage has sparked strong criticism of government efforts in committing $229.6 million to fix the youth justice system.
A teenager at Don Dale is seen through the fence. Source: ABC Australia
All of the Top End's 24 male juvenile inmates were being housed at the Darwin watch house on Wednesday night with the Don Dale centre declared a crime scene.
Its sole female inmate was to be moved elsewhere.
The worker suffered lacerations, which required stitches.
A group of about 12 inmates were involved in the uprising in which flames and smoke were seen into the early hours of Wednesday
The facility's school was destroyed by fire, with fuel stolen to use as an accelerant, while angle grinders were taken to cut fences in a bid to escape.
It took more than seven hours to find all detainees and restore order using tear gas after youths also threw items at police cars.
Criminal charges will be laid.
Dale Wakefield is set to brief the media about the situation at the centre. Source: AAP
It is a year since a Royal Commission recommended Don Dale be closed and more than six months since the Territory government accepted all 227 recommendations for fixing its broken detention system.
The Royal Commission was ordered after TV footage aired of teenagers being tear-gassed, spit-hooded and shackled.
NT deputy chief minister Nicole Manison insists conditions at Don Dale had improved and there was 'no excuse" for a worker to be attacked.
However she wasn't able to say when a new centre, with all the complications involved, would be built.
Non-government organisations including the Human Rights Law Centre, Amnesty International and National Indigenous Critical Response Service say conditions were not improving.
