Police move through classrooms and hallways adorned with children’s drawings before gunning down a heavily armed gunman: Harrowing video posted online Tuesday shows the intervention that ended the shooting at a school in Nashville, in the southern United States.
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The images, captured by two agents’ onboard cameras, testify to the tension that reigned among the teams deployed to the premises of the small Christian school, Covenant School, on Monday morning.
They also show the speed of their reaction after being invaded by a former student with two assault rifles and a pistol.
Most cops just have a bulletproof vest over their t-shirt and brandish a pistol. Those with guns are encouraged to pass.
When they arrived, an employee informed them that most of the children had been taken to safety, another handed them keys.
With a siren playing in the background, we see them moving quickly through the establishment, checking rooms one by one.
A few minutes later shots are heard. “It looks like it’s coming from above,” says one of them before tumbling down the stairs.
More shots can be heard, a “Jesus Fuck” (“whore”) is triggered. The breaths become heavier, the steps faster.
At the end of a corridor, they lead to a kind of light-flooded hall where the shooter is standing. From the broken window, he fired at the police who arrived as reinforcements.
The bullets bang immediately, the attacker – whose face has been made unrecognizable – slides to the ground. “Stop moving,” “Get your hands off your gun,” yells an already lifeless cop. After putting his guns aside, he picks up a walkie-talkie and announces, “Suspect down.”
Before he was shot, he killed three children aged 9 and three school employees, including the principal.