911 recordings show terror at Nashville school during attack
NASHVILLE: Nashville authorities released 911 calls on Thursday that capture the terror inside a Christian elementary school during an attack this week in which three children and three adults were killed, as callers pleaded for help in hushed voices as sirens, crying and gunfire could be heard in the background.
Police released recordings of three 911 calls made during Monday’s attack at The Covenant School.
In one, a man tells the dispatcher he is with a group of people, including several children, who are walking away from the school toward a main road. Although the man remains calm, the tension and confusion of the situation are clear, with several adults speaking over each other and children’s voices in the background.
When the dispatcher requests a description of the shooter, the caller asks a second man to get on the line.
“All I saw was a man holding an assault rifle shooting through the door. It was — he’s currently in the second grade hallway, upstairs” the second man says. “White man. With camouflage. He had a vest on and an assault rifle.”
“I think we have a shooter at our church,” he says, later adding: “I’m on the second floor in a room. I think the shooter is on the second floor.”
Three adults and three 9-year-old children were killed in the attack. Authorities say police shot and killed the assailant, a former student they identified as 28-year-old Audrey Hale.
The release of the recordings came as people protested at the Tennessee Capitol on Thursday in favor of tighter gun controls, haranguing the Republican-led Legislature to take action.
Chants of “Save our children!” echoed noisily in the hallways between the state Senate and House chambers, with protesters setting up shop inside and outside the Capitol. Some silently filled the Senate chamber’s gallery, including children who held signs reading “I’m nine” — a reference to the age of the kids who died. Most protesters were removed from the gallery after some began yelling down at the lawmakers, “Children are dead!”
The protests followed a Wednesday night candlelight vigil in Nashville where Republican lawmakers stood alongside first lady Jill Biden, Democratic lawmakers and musicians including Sheryl Crow, who has called for stricter gun controls since the attack.
The vigil was somber and at times tearful, as speaker after speaker read the victims’ names and offered condolences to their loved ones but refrained from any statement that could be seen as political.
Police have said Hale drove up to the school on Monday morning, shot out the glass doors, entered and began firing indiscriminately. Police later fatally shot Hale.
Among those killed were the three students, Evelyn Dieckhaus, Hallie Scruggs and William Kinney; Katherine Koonce, 60, the head of the school; substitute teacher Cynthia Peak, 61; and Mike Hill, a 61-year-old custodian.
Absent from the Wednesday vigil was Tennessee Republican Gov. Bill Lee, who has been an advocate for less restrictive gun laws along with greater school security and once intimated that prayer could protect Tennessee from school shootings and other things.
Lee issued a video statement Tuesday saying that Peak was a close friend of his wife, Maria, and that the two had been planning to meet for dinner on Monday.
“Maria woke up this morning without one of her best friends,” Lee said in a video statement, adding that his wife once taught with Peak and Koonce. The women, he said, “have been family friends for decades.”
Lee has avoided public appearances this week and has not proposed any possible steps his administration might take in response to the school shooting.
As with similar responses to gun violence, the state’s Republican leaders have avoided calling for tighter gun restrictions and instead have thrown their support behind adding more school security measures.
In a letter to Lee, Republican Lt. Gov. Randy McNally called for securing windows and glass in school buildings, adding magnetic locks on doors, modernizing camera systems, and increasing armed guards.
