Between eight and 10 people have been killed and a number of people injured in a shooting at a Texas high school.
Police responded to reports of a shooter at Santa Fe high school, about an hour from Houston, on Friday morning before 8am local time. Students evacuated the school amid a heavy presence of law enforcement and first responders.
The Harris county sheriff, Ed Gonzalez, said at least eight and perhaps 10 people, including students and staff from the school, had died. A suspect, believed to be a student at the school, has been arrested and a second “person of interest” has been detained, Gonzalez said. A school district police officer was among the injured and officers were searching the school, Gonzalez added.
“The number varies. It could be anywhere from eight to 10 fatalities,” he said.
Donald Trump broke off from an event at the White House and called it “ a very sad day”. He condemned “an absolutely horrific attack” and said his administration was “determined to do everything in our power” to prevent such incidents.
He said: “We are with you in this tragic hour and we will be with you forever. We will do everything we can to keep weapons out of our schools and out of the hands of those who should not have them.”
Trump pledged action on gun violence after the school shooting in Parkland, Florida, in February, and held high-level meetings with victims, survivors and lawmakers at the White House. But little action has resulted at the national level to change gun laws, despite a huge movement sparked by Parkland students calling for greater gun control.
Dakota Shrader, a 10th grader, told reporters: “We were in class. It was first period. The alarm started going off, everybody went outside, all the teachers were like: ‘Get this way, get this way, come over here.’ Next thing you know we hear the booms and everybody starts running as fast as they can.”
A friend was shot in the leg, she said, “and the next thing you know all the art [class] windows are getting shot, shattered”.
Authorities have not yet confirmed that report. Aerial footage from the scene showed students standing in a grassy field and three life-flight helicopters landing at the school.
An unknown number of possible explosive devices were found at the school and off campus. Authorities were in the process of rendering them safe and asked the public to call 911 if they see anything suspicious.
Student Michael Farina, 17, said he was on the other side of campus when the shooting began, and he thought it was a fire drill. He was holding a door open for special education students in wheelchairs when a principal came sprinting down the hall telling everyone to run. He said another teacher yelled out: “It is real.”
Students were led to take cover behind a car repair business across the street from the school. Some still did not feel safe and began jumping the fence behind the workshop to run even farther away, Farina said.
“I debated doing that myself,” he said. Students scattered into a wood, a field and to a nearby gas station for cover. When the initial danger had passed they were taken by school bus to a community center some distance away, where parents came to pick them up and in search of news of their loved ones.
Friday’s assault was the deadliest in Texas since a man with an assault rifle attacked a rural church late last year, killing more than two dozen people. It comes three months after the high school massacre in Parkland, Florida, that killed 17 and is the 16th school shooting this year that resulted in injury or death.
Santa Fe is a semi-rural commuter-belt city of about 13,000 residents located 30 miles (48km) south-east of Houston.
On Friday afternoon, the Washington-based Brady campaign to prevent gun violence lobbying group released a statement expressing sorrow and anger over the shooting and called for Congress “finally” to take action on legislation to combat gun violence.
Brady Campaign co-presidents Kris Brown and Avery Gardiner issued a joint statement that read: “We are heartbroken today. Once again, children are shot in their school. Once again, another mass shooting has grabbed the headlines, and meanwhile, so many other shootings go by without any attention.
“What will it take for Congress to step up and do their jobs to protect innocent children from gun violence? We fervently hope this is the day when our elected officials stand and take action.”