On Thursday morning, a shooter opened fire on a girl at Alpine High School, Texas, before committing suicide. The shooting occurred before 8 a.m. in the school’s band hall.

Brewster County Sheriff, Ronny Dodson, reported that in addition to the injured girl, a police officer was mistakenly shot and wounded by a marshal on campus. Information on the two people’s condition has yet to be released. According to one of the students at the school, they had just started their second-period class when a teacher was heard shouting, instructing pupils to get into the classroom.

Texas school, shooting
Alpine High School was placed on lockdown until students were evacuated by 9:40 a.m. Image credit: Alpine Avalanche

The teacher told them to get into the closet. While they were hiding they heard someone yelling and running through the corridor. Then after some time, a police officer banged the door and lead students to safety at a Jehovah’s Witness church.

As pupils were ushered out, the student reported that she saw blood on the floor of the cafeteria. She had said that she noticed the blood but could not take a good look at it as they were told to hurry out of the building with their hands up. “It was so scary and very intense. I’ve never been so scared in my life,” CNN reported.

Sul Ross State University also on lockdown

Following the lockdown of Alpine High School and the evacuation of the 280 students who attend the institution, Sul Ross State University was also locked down. According to International Business Times, fear of a bomb threat led students to also be evacuated. According to CBS 7, all institutions of learning in Alpine were on lockdown following the shooting that occurred.

The shooting shook the small city in Brewster County with a population of about 5900 students, according to New York Daily News. The alleged shooter’s grandfather was interviewed by CBS 7 and he told the news network that he did not know what could have prompted such an incident.

The shooter reportedly entered the band hall and shot a student in the lower back. She then went to the bathroom where she then turned the semi-automatic pistol, which Dodson stated had “plenty of ammunition,” on herself.

The identity of the shooter, a female student at Alpine High School, and the injured persons has yet to be revealed. Furthermore, there have been no reports as to why the shooter decided to open fire on one of her peers neither has there been any mention of comments made by any of her relatives.

One of the most unusual pieces of this puzzle is that the shooter is in fact female. According to Time, in cases of mass shootings, there is a 98% probability that the perpetrator is male. Although this particular incident involved the shooting of one person, it was still unexpected that the perpetrator be female.

Source: CNN