I'm not sure if y'all have been watching the news, but according to CNN, there have been approximately 25 people shot, at least 28 people transported, and 1 confirmed death in two seperate shootings at the Virginia Tech campus in Blacksburg VA. The students have had to deal with a prison fugitive running through campus and shooting in August, several bomb threats (two in the last two weeks), and now this shooting.
According to one of the victims, he said that in the second shooting in the academic building, the gunmen hit between 10-15 people, including possibly a professor. The one or two people shot in the dorm were on their way to the bathroom at around 7:15am.

They have one suspect was taken into custody but has since been shot. Unknown if he shot himself or he was shot by police.

I am absolutely beside myself! My best friend is a student at Tech and she's mortified. She lives less than a five minute walk from the dorm scene.

And now they're saying 22 people are dead. The numbers keep rising every minute. I keep having to change the numbers as I type this.

Please think/pray for those who have passed on, those who are injured, and those students who are safe but have to deal with the amazing grief of losing their peers.

And it's 21 now. Incredible. If it was my university, that would be almost 1% of the entire student body.

They'll all be in my thoughts.

Dani

My sister just told me all about it, she was watching the news and she started freaking out, because the exact same thing happened at her school (Dawson College, here in Montreal in September 2006).

My thoughts and prayers are with all of the students, staff, friends, family, and so on.

Things like this are absolutely disgusting and make me want to throw up. I can't comprehend the thought process behind shooting up a school campus - or anywhere else for that matter.

Yeah, I just heard about that ...

It's just particularly awful because massacres are so pointless. And I mean, at a college, I know that people always think colleges should be safe ... Wow. This is awful.

My sister is at Va Tech. She is safe and snug in her off-campus apartment, thank goodness. Right now, they are listing 22 fatalities and 28 wounded. It's just terrible.

When I heard this it felt like my stomach knotted up. I just hate hearing these things. School is supposed to be the safest place to be. We shouldn't have to worry about shootings while getting an education. Unfortunatly it is hard to prevent things like this. My prayers are with the students, staff, and families of those at Virginia Tech.

news.yahoo.com . . .

God this is frightening. I'm at American University in Washington D.C., and I was raised near VA Tech, and it's just horrifying. I know people that go there and I haven't heard from any of them, which is even more terrifying.

My mom always told me it was so difficult to raise children in this world, and I think I'm beginning to understand what she means.

This is terrible. The number of fatalities keeps changing and rising. What a horrible day.

I know 5 people who go there, but I've only been able to get in touch with two of them so far.

Yikes.

Oh my goodness! They will definitely be in my prayers! Are the 22 dead out of the 28 wounded? Like there were 28 wounded and 22 of them died? Or are there the 22 dead PLUS 28 wounded?

Poshoeda

22 dead PLUS another 28 wounded in the hopsital.

It's now been confirmed that the suspect shot himself and was not shot by police.

How awful!!

That film clip from the student reporter is so very disturbing! I wish they would stop replaying it. But I'm sure they will keep on. Something like 150,000 views on CNN's website so far.

These school shootings strike terror in the heart of every mother of every student around the world. I am hurting for all those affected and their families.

Prayers for all involved...

kk~

According to the Associated Press the shootings were up to 2 hours apart.

The film clips show police jogging around with weapons - on a 2600 acre campus. Walking ...jogging... hiding behind cars.

Don't they have a fleet of vehicles that can race across campus to storm buildings? Cars maybe? Swat trucks? Motorcycles?

If a shooting takes place at 7:15 am, shouldn't all buildings have police inside them shortly thereafter, and guarding all entrances and exits so that the shooter can't continue?

This incident should get a thorough review of police procedure! I would seem lives could have been saved. That'll be the next story.

What a tragedy.

^ The buildings you saw them "jogging around" were the buildings where the shootings took place, and buildings near by. I'm sure they were much more concerned with securing the area enough to remove all the victims. Getting around 50 wounded people out of a building is a little bit more important than driving out to check the grass fields 200 acres away from the scene.

But yeah, I'm livid that it took them 2 hours to lock down the campus.

Wow… not even one minute ago, a girl in my class got a text message from her friend who lives near Virginia Tech, and just told me what happened as I read the title of this post.

That’s absolutely horrific, and everyone will be in my thoughts and prayers.

Apparently, they DID lock down the campus, but lifted the lockdown for some reason and that's when the gunman was able to make the second strike.

And I just heard a report that he chained a door behind him, to make it impossible for those people in the building to escape.

EDIT: Death toll has risen to 31.

kk~

Just announced that the death toll is now at 31...

kk, that makes me feel sick inside that they lifted the lockdown and more fatalities happened. It shocks me that they’d lift it so soon, especially when the gunman was still loose. I can’t imagine the horror inside the buildings during all of it

I have two friends at VT and they are safe along with all of their friends. However, one of their friends freaked out and jumped out of the window and broke a rib in the process.

This is so devastating. I mean...what if this happened on the UMD campus? How safe would we be?

I was watching Tv & suddenly that came on, I was horrified.

They will definately be in my prayers.

That's so scary. It just makes you wonder if any place is safe anymore. It seems things like this are happening all the time now.

They and their families are in my prayers.

It's just been confirmed the biggest shoot out in US History. My room mate and I were watching the news around 12, when one person was confirmed dead and 20 injured, I went to the bathroom and it changed to 20 dead. Now I"m done with class and it's 30. I can't even imagine. What if it happened at my college? My college has always seemed safe but it's very open, I always hold the door open for people behind me going into the locked dorms and stuff. I'm not even sure if our campus police could handle a situation like that. Defiently scary and very realistic to my own life. I have one friend on facebook from VT who I went to elemntary school with. I haven't heard back from him, but he doesn't live in that building and he's not an engineering student so hopefully everything is ok. Keep praying!

Now all the people I know are accounted for. phew.

But still...:( It's just getting worse and worse.

I seriously DONT understand why they didnt shut down the campus with the first shooting! *sigh*

I have 3 friends there. I've gotten in touch with one person and she's okay. One is a grad student, so I'm hoping she was off campus. I just left a message with the third one, so I'm hoping to hear from him soon.

I lived in Roanoke (the main news station sending footage) for 7 years and a lot of my friends from school went there for college. I was considering going there for grad school and I don't think this will stop me from applying.

I've got them in my thoughts and prayers.

*Rosella`s brother comes in to the room....

Rosella`s brother: did you saw the new about the shooting that's going on on Virginia tech??

Rosella: No! Why??

Rosella`s brother: Why what??

Rosella: why do they started a shooting??

Rosella`s brother: Do you really think people this day need a reason to kill???

End of conversation*

This is really sad... in my head I still can't understand how somebody could do something like that!! There's no reason in the world to kill and shoot so many people!

I'm sick to death worrying about people I know there. I went to school just down the road from Tech, so this is very close to home for me. I have confirmation that three people I know are ok, but I haven't heard from about half a dozen more.

Don't they have a fleet of vehicles that can race across campus to storm buildings? Cars maybe? Swat trucks? Motorcycles?

That's a very complicated campus to navigate a vehicle around. It's more conducive to pesdestrian traffic: not a lot of wide spaces to get cars in, and even where there is space, there are barriers up that have to be taken down, etc. I'm not sure exactly where on campus these two buildings are, but if they're not right on the street, it would be pretty difficult to get any kind of vehicle that close in a timely fashion.