What happened
A 16-year-old boy opened fire at Silver Rail Elementary School in Bend, Oregon, on Thursday, 15 October, police said. The first emergency call, received at 12:59 local time, reported an unknown man shooting at a car. Within the next minute, the county dispatch centre received several more 911 calls saying someone had entered the school and begun shooting. Officers reached the building within minutes and found the suspect already shot dead. Police said a community member had seen him enter the school, followed him inside and shot him. Police described the shooter as a local 16-year-old and declined to give further details while the investigation continues, and it remains unclear whether he had any link to the school.
- First 911 call reports an unknown man shooting at a car
- Shooter is shot dead, police say, around 13:02 local time
Victims and injuries
Police said three children were killed, aged five, eight and 11, along with a teacher. Counting the shooter, five people died, a total that CBS reported citing sources. Two others were taken to hospital: a seven-year-old child and a 54-year-old teacher, both described by police as being in critical condition. Steven Cook, superintendent of the Bend-La Pine school district, issued a statement after the shooting.
We are stunned and heartbroken by this senseless tragedy.
Cook added that no words could adequately express the grief the community is experiencing. A resident who lives about a mile from the school said she was walking her dog on Thursday when she heard three loud pops, followed by what sounded like three more.
Evacuation and police response
Police evacuated the school's classrooms and bused students to Journey Church, a little over two kilometres away, where they were reunited with their families. Police asked parents and guardians to go to that site and asked the public to avoid the area. Miller, the Bend police spokeswoman, said Silver Rail serves kindergarten through fifth grade and has about 450 students and 40 staff. Police said a significant police presence would remain around the school and the church for as long as necessary.
Reaction and wider context
The gun-control group Brady said on X that school shootings are not inevitable, and Giffords, founded by a Democratic elected official who was shot in 2011, urged that such violence not be accepted as unavoidable. According to the Gun Violence Archive, cited by Deutsche Welle, the US has seen more than 365 mass shootings so far this year, counting incidents in which four or more people are shot excluding the shooter. The deadliest school shooting in US history took place at Virginia Tech on 16 April 2007, when Seung-Hui Cho killed 32 people and wounded 17 others.