At least four people have been killed after a gunman opened fire on a hospital campus in Tulsa, Oklahoma on Wednesday, police have confirmed.
As per CNN, authorities believe that the shooter turned the gun on himself after the attack. Tulsa Police Department Deputy Chief Eric Dalgleish confirmed in the news conference that he had also died.
A further number of people are said to have been injured in the shooting, though their injuries are not life-threatening and the death toll isn’t expected to rise.
Reports state that a call concerning an active shooter at the Natalie Medical Building on the St. Francis Hospital Campus in Tulsa, Oklahoma, was fielded just after 4:50 p.m. local time.
Responding officers arrived on scene minutes later and heard shots coming from inside the building. Deputy Chief Dalgleish told how they followed the sounds to the second floor of the building, where they made contact with the victims and the suspect.
“The scene is fairly limited to one section of that floor, on the second floor,” Dalgleish said.
The Deputy Chief said that authorities are closing in on identifying the suspect, who was armed with one rifle and one handgun.
“It appears both weapons, at one point or another, were fired,” Dalgleish explained.
No officers are said to have been harmed in the shooting.
As of last night (Wednesday, June 1) the families of the victims were being notified.
“It’s a horribly tragic event,” police Capt. Richard Meulenberg said.
“I’m very, very proud of the officers for getting there as quickly as they did, very well potentially stopping more people from losing their life today.”
Meulenberg told how the attempt to evacuate people after it became clear that there was a gunman on site turned chaotic.
“It was just madness inside, with hundreds of rooms and hundreds of people trying to get out of the building,” Meulenberg said.
According to reports, President Joe Biden has been brief on the shooting and the White House is monitoring the situation closely.
“What happened today in Tulsa is a senseless act of violence and hatred,” Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt wrote on Twitter. “I am grateful for the quick and brave actions of the Tulsa Police Department and other first responders who did their best to contain a terrible situation.”
The attack comes just one week after the shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas which left 21 dead, including 19 children.
How many more times are we going to have to bear witness to shootings that leave any number of innocent people dead?
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