I'm on a lunch break and am just now hearing about this:
Twenty-seven people, including 18 children, have been killed in a shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary
School, according to the Associated Press.
The report cites an official with knowledge of the situation.
Sources told The Courant that there are at least 20 shooting victims. Many of the shootings took place in a kindergarten classroom, sources said.
One entire classroom is unaccounted for, sources said.
A person believed to be a shooter is dead. Earlier reports of a second shooter are unconfirmed.
Three people were brought to Danbury Hospital, but their condition is unknown. The emergency room is on lockdown.
Police were still searching the school at 11 a.m., and police dogs had been brought in. Around noon, the triage area was broken down, stretchers were taken away and the SWAT team left the building.
Shortly after 9:40 a.m., police reported that a shooter was in the main office of the school. A person in one room had “numerous gunshot wounds,” police said.
Groups of students — some crying, some holding hands — were being escorted away from the school by their teachers. Some students were still in the school at 10:30 a.m., parents said.
School and local emergency officials are accounting for the children, who will be released to their parents to get them home. A staging area has been set up at the Sandy Hook fire department, directly in front of the school.
Frustrated parents are trying to get information from officials, who are still actively searching the school.
Parent Richard Wilford said his Sandy Hook second-grader, Richie, heard what he described as “pans falling” when gunshots rang out. He said that his son told him that the teacher went to go check, came back in and locked the door and told the students to stand in the corner.
“What does a parent think about coming to a school where there’s a shooting” It’s the most terrifying moment of a parent’s life … you have no idea,” said Wilford.
Eight-year-old Alexis Wasik, a third-grader at the school, said police were checking everybody inside the school before they were escorted to the firehouse.
"We had to walk with a partner," she said.
One child leaving the school said that there was shattered glass everywhere. A police officer ran into the classroom and told them to run outside and keep going until the reach the firehouse.
I cannot imagine the horror and the pain those with loved ones involved are going through right now.
Mother Mary, pray for them. St. Michael, pray for them.
Lord Christ, send your Holy Spirit to minister to them.
UPDATE: Horrible things are happening to children today. This in China:
A knife-wielding man slashed 22 children and an adult at an elementary school in central China on Friday, state media reported, the latest in a series of attacks on schoolchildren in the country.
The man attacked the children at the gate of a school in Chenpeng village in Henan province, the Xinhua news agency reported.
Police arrested a 36-year-old man, identified as villager Min Yingjun, Xinhua said. It did not give further details of the extent of the injuries.
Horrific.
God have mercy.
