As you might have heard, 33 people were killed on Monday and more than 15 injured on the campus of Virginia Tech. It is said to be the deadliest shooting in American history, according to federal law enforcements. Many of the victims were students shot in a dormitory and a classroom.
Witnesses described scenes of chaos and unimaginable horror as some students were lined up against a wall and shot. Other students jumped out of windows to escape. The killings occurred in two separate attacks. The first shooting was around 7:15 a.m., when two people were shot and killed at a dormitory. More than two and a half hours later, 31 others, including the gunman, were shot and killed across campus in a classroom building, where some of the doors had been chained.
The gunman had no identification but we do know that he was an Asian man in his 20s. It is extremely sad that this happen and I can only imagine the grief over the campus. The main problem that people seem to be having a problem with is the fact that this gunman killed 2 people and made his way across campus to another building two hours later and not one student was notified. Not until later, there was an email sent out to stay inside. There was also an immediate lockdown placed and so no one could leave dorms or classrooms. Unfortunately, there was no way for the students to find out what was going on, so the Internet played a wonderful part in informing the students.
Other students used the Internet to find out what was going on by posting to one another and keeping in touch and creating a message board. One student said that it was the only way she could find out what exactly was going on. A federal law enforcer stated that one way they could have avoided this was by sending mass text messaging out to the students, faculty, and staff. This is a great idea, and this event will only expedite the research to get this "emergency text service" up in running.
There will not be any classes tomorrow at Virginia Tech, although it will take longer than that for those that were in those classrooms. I reach out to the relatives of the victims and their friends. This shooting was the second in the past year that forced the school to lock down. In August of 2006, an escaped jail inmate shot and killed a deputy sheriff and a security guard at a nearby hospital before the police caught him in the woods near the university.
Other students used the Internet to find out what was going on by posting to one another and keeping in touch and creating a message board. One student said that it was the only way she could find out what exactly was going on. A federal law enforcer stated that one way they could have avoided this was by sending mass text messaging out to the students, faculty, and staff. This is a great idea, and this event will only expedite the research to get this "emergency text service" up in running.
There will not be any classes tomorrow at Virginia Tech, although it will take longer than that for those that were in those classrooms. I reach out to the relatives of the victims and their friends. This shooting was the second in the past year that forced the school to lock down. In August of 2006, an escaped jail inmate shot and killed a deputy sheriff and a security guard at a nearby hospital before the police caught him in the woods near the university.
For more information, vist the Virginia Tech page.
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