Four people were killed and at least nine were injured on Wednesday in a shooting at a high school outside Atlanta where students ran to seek safety in a football stadium, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation said.
Shots were fired on Wednesday morning, and officers swarmed the campus of Apalachee High School as parents raced to find out if their children were safe at the school in Winder, Georgia.
A suspect was in custody, authorities said. It was not immediately clear if the gunman was a student at the school.
“What you see behind us is an evil thing,” Barrow County Sheriff Jud Smith said at a brief news conference outside the school. He declined to give details about casualties, or about the suspect.
The episode is just the latest among dozens of school shootings across the US in recent years, including especially deadly ones in Newtown, Connecticut; Parkland, Florida; and Uvalde, Texas. The killings in classrooms have set off fervent debates about gun control and children are growing up accustomed to active shooting drills in classrooms.
Last year ended with 217 deaths from 42 mass killings in the US, making 2023 one of the deadliest years on record in the country.
Student Jacob King said he had dozed off in his world history class after morning football practice when he heard about 10 gunshots.
He said he did not believe the shooting was real until he heard an officer yelling at someone to put down their gun. He said when his class was led out, he saw officers shielding what appeared to be an injured student.
Ashley Enoh was at home on Wednesday morning when she got a text from her brother, who is a senior at Apalachee High.
“Just so you know, I love you,” he texted her.
When she asked in the family group chat what was going on, he said there was a gunman at the school.
Student Layla Ferrell was in a health class when the words “hard lockdown” appeared on a screen in the classroom and lights began flashing. She said she and her frightened classmates piled desks and chairs in front of the door to create a barricade.
Few details were immediately available from authorities, who were dispatched shortly before 10.30am to respond to an “active shooting”, the sheriff’s office said in a statement.
Helicopter video from WSB-TV showed dozens of law enforcement and emergency vehicles surrounding the school in Barrow County, about 50 miles (80KM) north-east of Atlanta.
When Erin Clark, 42, received a text from her son Ethan, a senior at the high school, that there was an active gunman, she rushed from her job at the Amazon warehouse to the school. The two texted “I love you” and Ms Clark said she prayed for her son as she drove to the high school.
With the main road blocked to the school, Ms Clark parked and ran with other parents. Parents were then directed to the football field. Amid the chaos, Ms Clark found Ethan.
Ms Clark said her son was writing an essay in class when he first heard the gunshots. Her son then worked with his classmates to barricade the door and hide.
“I’m so proud of him for doing that,” she said. “He was so brave.
“It makes me scared to send him back,” she said. “I don’t know what I’m going to do.”
Traffic going to the school was queued up for more than a mile as parents tried to get to their children there.
“I have directed all available state resources to respond to the incident at Apalachee High School and urge all Georgians to join my family in praying for the safety of those in our classrooms, both in Barrow County and across the state,” Georgia Governor Brian Kemp said in a statement.
“We will continue to work with local, state, and federal partners as we gather information and further respond to this situation,” Mr Kemp added.
In a statement, the FBI’s Atlanta office said: “FBI Atlanta is aware of the current situation at Apalachee High School in Barrow County. Our agents are on scene co-ordinating with and supporting local law enforcement.”
The White House said President Joe Biden has been briefed about the shooting and the administration will co-ordinate with federal, state and local officials as it receives more information.
Apalachee High School has about 1,900 students, according to records from Georgia education officials. It became Barrow County’s second largest public high school when it opened in 2000, according to the Barrow County School System. It is named after the Apalachee River on the southern edge of Barrow County.
The shooting had reverberations in Atlanta, where patrols of schools in that city were increased, authorities said. More patrols of Atlanta schools would be done “for the rest of the day out of an abundance of caution”, Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens said.
“It’s just outrageous that every day, in our country, in the United States of America, that parents have to send their parents to school worried about whether or not their child will come home alive,” Vice President Kamala Harris said during a campaign stop in New Hampshire.
In a message posted to social media, former president Donald Trump said: “These cherished children were taken from us far too soon by a sick and deranged monster.”
