A normal Thursday at an Oregon elementary school turned deadly after a teenager carrying a long gun approached the building. What happened next unfolded with extraordinary speed.
Within minutes, children and teachers were hiding inside classrooms as emergency dispatchers received dozens of calls. Officers were racing toward the school, but events inside were already moving toward a sudden end.
The timeline would later show just how little time passed. It would also reveal that, before the first officers reached the school, someone else had followed the gunman inside.
The First Call Came at 12:59 P.M.
The shooting happened Thursday, October 15, at Silver Rail Elementary School in Bend, Oregon, where roughly 400 to 450 children attend. According to the New York Post, the suspected gunman was a 16-year-old Bend resident.
Police said the first emergency call came at 12:59 p.m. The initial report did not come from inside the school. Bend Police Department Chief Mike Krantz said a person in a vehicle reported being shot at multiple times by someone carrying a long gun.
The teenager then reached the school itself. Police said he fired at the school’s locked doors to gain entry. Once he was inside, dispatchers began receiving dozens of calls reporting a shooter in the building.
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The attack left three children, ages five, eight, and 11, dead. A teacher was also killed. A 7-year-old student and a 54-year-old teacher were hospitalized in critical condition.
The victims’ families had been notified by the time authorities held an evening briefing. According to the Associated Press, a law enforcement official briefed on the investigation said the attacker used a pump-action shotgun purchased by his mother.
The official spoke anonymously because they were not authorized to publicly discuss the investigation.