Uvalde in mourning after elementary school mass shooting
Around 11:30 a.m. Tuesday, May 24, 18-year-old gunman Salvador Ramos began shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde County, killing 19 children and two adults, all from the same classroom.
“What happened in Uvalde is a horrific tragedy that cannot be tolerated in the state of Texas,” Gov. Greg Abbott said Tuesday.
Ramos, an Uvalde resident, abandoned his vehicle and entered the elementary school with a handgun and possibly a rifle, according to Abbott.
Ramos legally bought two rifles and 375 rounds of ammunition just after his 18th birthday earlier this month, according to a briefing to state Sen. John Whitmire.
About 30 minutes before he entered the school, Ramos shared messages through Facebook that he was going to shoot his grandmother, then later confirmed that he had shot her, according to Abbott. Ramos then wrote that he planned to shoot an elementary school. The 66-year-old grandmother remains in critical condition.
A spokesperson from Meta, the parent company of Facebook, said those messages were private, one-to-one messages that were discovered after the shooting, and that the company was cooperating with law enforcement in the ongoing investigation.
Ramos crashed his grandmother’s truck near the school, and according to Abbott, police officers employed by the school district “engaged” with Ramos, who entered the school through a back door, entered a classroom and began firing with an AR-15 rifle.
According to a spokesperson from the Texas Department of Public Safety, Ramos barricaded himself inside the classroom and began shooting. Law enforcement officers tried to enter the school but were fired upon. At that point officers then began breaking windows in an attempt to evacuate children, teachers and staff.
Officers eventually forced their way into the classroom and killed Ramos, who wore a tactical vest, according to the spokesperson.
The shooting in Uvalde was Texas’ deadliest school shooting, and the second-deadliest shooting at an elementary, middle or high school on record in the U.S., following the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary shooting in Newtown, CT. It was Texas’ eighth mass shooting in 13 years.
About 85 miles west of San Antonio, Robb Elementary School teaches second through fourth grade students. The school had 535 students in the 2020-2021 school year.