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Many Dead In Virginia Tech Shooting
nexuspal writes "Over 20 confirmed dead at Virginia Tech. Shooter killed some at residence hall then two hours later killed others in classrooms. Worst school shooting in US history. "
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See headline. Check favorite news outlets, or see the developing story, including people monitoring scanners, several students posting live in the thread, and people grappling with the various sources of information in this Fark thread.
ACs are modded -6. I don't read you, I don't mod you, I don't see you. Don't like it? Don't be a coward.
Have some friends in the area, so our usual gang was trying to figure out what was up.
From what I heard they put all schools in the county into lockdown when the attack was detected - not just college campuses. The gunman is apparently dead, but obviously everyone is extremely nervous.
Apparently the campus had had bomb threats in the last two weeks. No idea if they're connected:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18134671/
My thoughts are with the lost and their loved ones.
"The Sage treasures Unity and measures all things by it" - Lao Tzu
He was on Fox around 3:15 Eastern (I think. Time may be off), almost in tears talking about how HL2, GTA, and the others prepared the guy for violence - notwithstanding his name hasn't even been released yet.
ACs are modded -6. I don't read you, I don't mod you, I don't see you. Don't like it? Don't be a coward.
I submitted this story as well, and in my summary I stated that this being a tech site, there are probably a lot of virginia tech students alumni in the readership, and therefore it is appropriate to post this on /.
This whole incident makes me sick to my stomach, and my thoughts/prayers go out to the families and victims.
I got nothin'
Jack Thompson was already on the news blaming it on video games. What a sick fuck. Using this horror to advance his personal agenda. What a sick, sick human being.
http://www.judicial.vt.edu/upsl.php
10. Fireworks/Explosives/Hazardous Chemicals/Weapons
Unauthorized possession or use of fireworks, explosives, or weapons is prohibited. Hazardous chemicals that could pose a health risk are also prohibited from the campus, including chemicals that, when combined with other substances, could be hazardous or present a danger to others.
Unauthorized possession, storage (in vehicles on campus as well as in the residence halls), or control of firearms and weapons on university property is prohibited. (NOTE: Organizational weapons of the Virginia Tech Corps of Cadets, approved by the commandant, are not prohibited by this policy.) Firearms are defined as any gun, rifle, pistol, or handgun designed to fire bullets, BBs, pellets, or shots (including paint balls), regardless of the propellant used. Other weapons are defined as any instrument of combat or any object not designed as an instrument of combat but carried for the purpose of inflicting or threatening bodily injury. Examples include (but are not limited to) knives with fixed blades or pocket knives with blades longer than four inches, razors, metal knuckles, blackjacks, hatchets, bows and arrows, nun chahkas, foils, or any explosive or incendiary device. Possession of realistic replicas of weapons on campus is prohibited. Students who store weapons in residence hall rooms, who brandish weapons, or who use a weapon in a reckless manner may face disciplinary action which may include suspension or dismissal from the university.
Refer to Section V.W. for additional information about Weapons.
Yes, "extremely low": 14 dead in UofT shootings. Good job that all those who kept the shooter pinned down did not turn around and started shooting everybody at random. Get real, man - if everyone around you carries guns and automatic rifles, then don't be surprised that once in a while something like this happens. If this guy had only access to knives and similar things, he could've killed 2-3 people at most, but not 32. What an insane country. Next time we'll hear about another "record"...
Mod this comment up - incredibly important point. You know this image? http://www.foxnews.com/photoessay/photoessay_1642_ images/0416071259_M_041607_shooting1.jpg
Yeah, that was just a reporter. He was released.
From what I've been reading they did lock down the campus to a point. After the first shooting they told everyone to stay inside, away from windows, etc etc. They just couldn't get to this sick @#$* in time.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
You are an idiot. Students wouldn't have been able to "pin down" the UT tower shooter unless they were carrying rifles in their school packs. You think a handgun has that kind of range? The death toll was so low because he was sniping at distant targets, not spraying bullets w/ a semi-automatic.
Would guns on campus have prevented more people from getting shot? Who the hell knows? Maybe it would have meant several people trying to play hero and causing even more casualties by shooting wildly in the direction of the gunman.
To get a CCP in the vast majority of states you have to show you are proficient in handling a firearm. I can't speak for other states, but the people who can pass a CCP exam aren't the type that will be shooting wildly.
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
I think that the point is: how the hell could be so easy for anybody to get such arsenal?!
ABC is reporting that it was 2 semi-automatic pistols. Hardly an asrenal.
This is the unedited transcript of the VT afternoon press conference at about 4:45 PM ET. Next press conference will be at 7:30 PM ET:
- I am vice president for university relations. We will begin this with a short statement by the president. All of the individuals will be available for comment. The president will identify him in his opening comments. We will stay here as long as you need us to. Afterwards, i will be available for comment. Obviously, there are an awful lot of you and there is one of me. I would recommend that we try to get as much as we can accomplish in this press briefing today.
- Thank you. Just a few minutes ago , i spoke with president bush and he conveyed his concern and condolences for everyone in washington and offered all of the help that they could possibly provide. I' ve also spoken with the governor who was coming back from tokyo. He has declared a state of emergency which allows us to access significant oth er assets at that will be required to do with this tragedy. With me today is the secretary for public service for the commonwealth of virginia, john marshall, and the superintendent for the virginia state police. Also is the mayor of b lacksburg, the chief of the blacksburg police department and the chief of the virginia tech police. I want to repeat my horror and disbelief and profound sorrow at the events of today. People from around the world have expressed their shock and their sorrow. I am really at a loss for words to explain or understand the carnage that has visited our campus. I know no other way to speak about this than to tell you what we now. It is now confirmed that we have at 31 deaths from the norris hall , including the gunman. 15 Other victims are being treated at hospitals. There are two confirmed deaths from the shooting in the dormitory, in addition to those at norris hall. We' ve not confirmed the activity of the gun man because he carried no at the dedication. We are in the process of attempting a dedication identification. We are in the proces s of notifying next of kin. This will take some time. We will not release any names unti l we are positive of this edification. We anticipate being able to release a list sometime tomorrow. We' re asking our students to contact their parents and let them know their status. Our investigation continues into whether there is a connection between the first and second incidents. That has not been decided. We know that the parents will want to embrace their children. We are not suggesting that you come to campus, however, if pa rents feel that it must come to campus, we are locating counselors at the end of virginia tech to be available. As you can imagine, security, investigation, operational, and counseling resources are very taxed at this moment. However, we are getting assistance from the state police, the fbi, the atf, local jurisdictions, and the red cross. We understand the desire and the compelling need to get information on the part of families, stu dents, and loved ones. Unfortunately, this is all of the information that we can verify at this point in time. We are posting information o n our web site as we learned it. I communication systems are taxed . We are posting information on the web site for the state police. I think we are ready to take questions.
- Why not shut down campus after the first shooting rather g -- shooting?
- The information that we have less to make the decision that it was an isolated event to that building and the decision was not made to cancel class' s at that time.
- Can you say why the students were not notified for tw o hours?
- They were notified that there was a shooting. You have to remember that of the 26,000 is that we have, only about 9000 are on campus. When the class start at 9:00 A.M., Thou sands of people are in transit. The question is, where do you keep them when it is most safe? We concluded that the incident at the dormitory was domestic in question. This other events occurred two hours later.
- The first e-mail did not arrive
And to think, they had recently ensured no CCW holders could carry their weapons on campus: "Virginia Tech spokesman Larry Hincker was happy to hear the bill was defeated. "I'm sure the university community is appreciative of the General Assembly's actions because this will help parents, students, faculty and visitors feel safe on our campus."
The most US-centric report about the idea that the United States is filled with gun-toting violent crazies still fails to exonerate the United States entirely. The key column here is Firearm Homicide. The rest are just there to confuse you, pointing out that violent deaths don't always involve guns. Duh. While it's true that Estonia, Brazil, Mexico and Northern Ireland have higher Firearm Homicide rates than the US; Canada, Germany, Singapore, Japan, England, Australia, Norway, Ireland, Israel and Spain have only 25-50% of the Firearm Homicide rate per 100,000. OK, so there's more violent people out there, but even statistics that are attempting to prove your point have a difficult reality to overcome.
Here's the other side of the coin, which is what most people think of when they think of the United States and their gun problem. The numbers aren't substantially different, but the presentation sure is. Gotta love statistics -- I had to read these two articles for 30 minutes before posting to be sure I didn't put my foot in my mouth.
"Please describe the scientific nature of the 'whammy'" - Agent Scully
As an alumnus of the university, I agree that it's silly to blame the school, especially at this point. It's really easy to play "Monday morning quarterback" after the fact.
... is just insane.
Blacksburg is a very safe environment. The police really don't deal much with major crimes, aside from your normal array of drunken college students gone bad. Actual deaths are extremely rare. When the shooting occurred earlier in the year, regarding an escaped inmate who stumbled onto campus, that was surreal and shocking. But the leap to this
I can't imagine the police and campus security were really prepared for this, since nothing of this magnitude remotely enters our minds.
-- jchenx
Well, I'm here at tech, and am still waiting for word on whether or not I've lost any friends today. One roommate of mine may have already lost one, and some friends have lost friends of theirs.
No guns are allowed on campus. We have a few full-time shrinks on campus. The engineering student was probably an american (most of our foreign students are grad students). So far the word is the kid was a senior with 3 engineering majors. We have lots of bible groups, etc on campus, but we're not really known for being very religious or very secular for that matter.
My guess would be stress. I've seen grown men cry over single assignments, several of them, over the years here @ VT. The engineering kids are pushed really hard, and many of them don't deal with it very well. 60 hours a week of real work are pretty normal, with classes that everage 27-50%, which are only curved at the end (and nobody knows the curve till then). Try that for 4 years while growing up... Many engineering students I know end up having fairly empty shells of personalities, as their entire lives so far have circled around work and thinly veiled attempts at having a life on the side.
3 engineering majors at once would break most people. Guaranteed.
So far, the big questions are:
1. Why didn't the students find out about the 7:15am shooting until 2 hours later
2. Why was only the dorm closed?
To be fair, we had two bomb threats (no bombs) over the last 2 weeks, the last one only 3 days ago. So maybe the administration was getting tired of interrupting school for non-issues.
Care about electronic freedom? Consider donating to the EFF!
Oh, but they do! See here or here.
And so do the Canadians -- see here.
No one is immune to such aberrant behaviour.
licet differant, aequabitur
Sure. It happens quite often. http://www.guncite.com/kleckandgertztable1.html Even the very conservative estimates put the number at over half a million per year. The most thorough survey puts it at around 2 million per year.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
There are a few different types of people who don't feel empathy and we shouldn't confuse them. There are sociopathic types who are generally the small-time swindlers you mention. They enjoy manipulating people and probably aren't the mass-murdering type. There are also schizoid (not schizotypal) people who generally don't feel any emotions, but don't care, don't need other people, feel fine alone, and are very unlikely to go on killing sprees. And then there are the Antisocial types who want to and try to fit in but cannot, feel very empty inside, and become very angry about it--angry against the world in general. These are the most likely to go on mass killing sprees.
People experiencing the kind of psychopathy you seem to allude to are more likely to be serial killers who evade detection than mass murders who also commit suicide.
Almost every building on campus has underground passages. However, the 2nd floor of Norris Hall has double wide, wooden doors with handles that can be held with chains. I've never run across to the attached building to see how they are connected, but the ones I've used are easily 'locked' with chains. The door of Norris is also VERY big and heavy, made of solid wood about 10ft high, it actually requires a bit of strength just to open, so if that was chained from the inside, it would be almost impossible for a single person to open that door.
Here you go: http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/hicrc/Firearms.htm 1. Guns and homicide (literature review). We performed a review of the academic literature on the effects of gun availability on homicide rates. Major Findings: A broad array of evidence indicates that gun availability is a risk factor for homicide, both in the United States and across high-income countries. Case-control studies, ecological time-series and cross-sectional studies indicate that in homes, cities, states and regions in the US, where there are more guns, both men and women are at higher risk for homicide, particularly firearm homicide. In other words, owning a gun makes you more likely to be killed by a gun ...
2. Gun availability and state homicide rates, 1988-1997
Using a validated proxy for firearm ownership, we analyzed the relationship between firearm availability and homicide across 50 states over a ten year period.
Major findings: After controlling for poverty and urbanization, for every age group, people in states with many guns have elevated rates of homicide, particularly firearm homicide.
In other words, the more people "packing heat" in your state, the more likely you'll be shot to death
3. Gun availability and state homicide rates, 2001-2003
Using survey data on rates of household gun ownership, we examined the association between gun availability and homicide across states, 2001-2003.
Major Findings: States with higher levels of household gun ownership had higher rates of firearm homicide and overall homicide. This relationship held for both genders and all age groups, after accounting for rates of aggravated assault, robbery, unemployment, urbanization, alcohol consumption, and resource deprivation (e.g., poverty). There was no association between gun prevalence and non-firearm homicide.
A gun in the house means you're more likely to kill yourself or someone is more likely to kill you.
Srolling down, we come to this:
RECENT FIREARMS RESEARCH
Harvard Injury Control Research Center 2001-2006
Firearms Research Archive 1990-1998
Firearms Research Archive 1998-2003
Firearms Research Archive 2004-2005
The Firearm Research Center:
David Hemenway, Matthew Miller, Deborah Azrael, Beth Molnar, and Lisa Hepburn
Funded by the Joyce Foundation
(unpublished material is not to be cited w/o approval of authors)
BOOK: Hemenway, David. "Private Guns and Public Health" Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2004. This book summarizes the literature on the relationship between guns and injuries and describes the public health approach to reducing firearm-related violence. More information at the University of Michigan Press website: http://www.press.umich.edu/titleDetailDesc.do?id=1 7530
ARTICLES:
I GUNS AND DEATH
A: HOMICIDE
1. Guns and homicide (literature review).
We performed a review of the academic literature on the effects of gun availability on homicide rates.
Major Findings: A broad array of evidence indicates that gun availability is a risk factor for homicide, both in the United States and across high-income countries. Case-control studies, ecological time-series and cross-sectional studies indicate that in homes, cities, states and regions in the US, where there are more guns, both men and women are at higher risk for homicide, particularly firearm homicide.
Publication: Hepburn, Lisa; Hemenway, David. "Firearm Availability and Homicide: A Review of the Literature." Aggression and Violent Behavior: A Review Journal. 2004; 9:417-40.
2. Gun availability and state homicide rates, 1988-1997
Using a validated proxy for firearm ownership, we analyzed the relationship between firearm availability and homicide across 50 states over a ten year period.
Major findings: After controlling for poverty and urbanization, for every age group, people in states with many guns have elevated rates of homicide, particularly firearm homicide.
Publi
First, let me say that I am a student at Virginia Tech, and this has been a trying day for everyone here in Blacksburg. I can't imagine what it was like for my fellow Hokies who were in Norris Hall. That said, I had to reply to this...
The solution to school shootings is *more* guns in the classrooms?
Currently at Virginia Tech, there are NO guns in classrooms (unless someone is carrying one on campus illegally like the shooter today). Banning guns on campus did nothing to avert this tragedy. It did prevent law abiding students from carrying protection and possibly stopping this guy partway through his rampage. It's very possible the same outcome would have occurred if guns were allowed on campus. However, banning guns won't prevent criminals from using them.
Yeah, quite interesting readings.
c rime-murders-per-capita (to say the truth, this is data from 2000, so quite old):
. pdf), quite up to date, uh? Well, let's see 746 murders in that period (including the 57 victims from the 7/7 London bombs), which makes 14.0 per million.
But sorrily they forget about a very "little and simple" fact: chances to be violently killed per million inhabitants. One would think that's an easy and clear number, isn't it? But, hey, they seemed to forget about it in the NRA-supported articles you kindly cite.
Well, here come some numbers http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mur_percap-
United States: 0.042802 per 1,000 people
France: 0.0173272 per 1,000 people
Australia: 0.0150324 per 1,000 people
Canada: 0.0149063 per 1,000 people
United Kingdom: 0.0140633 per 1,000 people
Germany: 0.0116461 per 1,000 people
Japan: 0.00499933 per 1,000 people
So, your chances to be killed in the USA were x3 those from "wild Australia", "violent UK" or "mad Canada", or x10 those from "samuray Japan".
But, hey, this is old data!
Well, here comes the "2005/2006 Home Office Statistical Bulletin for England and Wales" (http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs07/hosb0207
And what about the USA? Well, disastercenter (http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/uscrime.htm) says there were 16,692 murders in 2005, or 56 murders per million. Hummm... how much it does 56/14? Well, it's even WORSE THAN DATA FROM 2000! Your bets of being murdered in USA are 4x those from the "wild UK". Isn't it soooooooo strange after the "facts" from our friends of the NRA?
My apologies to Mr. Chiang-- he has posted a note saying that he was not the shooter. As he says on the same livejournal:
I am not the shooter. Through this experience, I have received numerous death threats, slanderous accusations, and my phone is out of charge from the barrage of calls. Local police have been notified of the situation.