In a repetition of shooting disasters gripping the United States, a single gunman vehemently sprayed bullets at a crowd of revelers at a country music festival in Las Vegas. The Gunman was able to inflict heavy damages by killing 58 and injuring almost 500 people because of a vantage point from his room on the 32nd floor of a Las Vegas hotel. The gory incident is now being regarded as the worst mass shooting in recent American history.
What is surprising this time is the fact that the lone shooter identified as Stephen Craig Paddock is 64. He kept on firing and picking off people from the crowd below his hotel room window at the Mandalay Casio and Bay Resort. The crowd at the country music festival going down below numbered a good 20,000 strong.
Once people realized what was happening and victims began falling down dead before their eyes, there was panic as the terrified crowd thinking they were under a terrorist attack ran for their lives.
Witnesses statements were record by new agencies as saying ‘’ “We heard what sounded like firecrackers going off. Then all of a sudden we heard what sounded like a machine gun. People started screaming that they were hit," witness Meghan Kearney told MSNBC. "When we started running out, there were probably a couple hundred [people] on the ground.”
Eye witness accounts said that victims were dropping like flies as some were shot one foot away from those who survived. The rapid fire shots were heard everywhere.
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Police have confirmed that the suspect Stephen Craig 64 shot himself before police could break into his room. Earlier reports believed that police officials had shot him instead. Craig had checked into the hotel on the 28th of September as stated by Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Sheriff Joseph Lombardo. Police even found more than 10 rifles in his room which suggested he had planned the ghastly crime.
The Las Vegas shooting has been termed as an act of pure evil by President Donald Trump. The office of the white house and the US Capitol lowered their flags at half mast in respect of those who died in the shooting.
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The Las Vegas shooting is in no way connected to any terrorist act or group but was the actions of a deranged man. Former Police Sheriif Bill Young’s daughter who was attending the concert said the shots sounded like machine gun fire as she and her friends took cover.
Young was reported to have said “"I picked up the phone, my cell phone, and she was screaming and yelling, 'Dad, dad, dad, dad, somebody’s shooting at us, and I don’t know what to do.' She was hysterical and I tried to just calm her down," Young said. "She could hear the gun shots — sounded like a machine gun, she said — and they didn’t know where they were coming from. She had nowhere to take cover, so I told her just to run as fast as she could, as quick as she could out of the arena. Get as far away from it as she could where she thought the line of fire might be."
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58 people confirmed killed while more than 518 injured as of now. The injury toll could rise further. This was the deadliest mass shooting event in modern America history. The gunman was identified by officials as Stephen Craig Paddock 64 from Mesquite Nevada. He has never had a criminal record. The brother of the shooter Eric Paddock was shocked. He said his brother was an ordinary guy who went to hotels, gambled and went to shows.
Police have also located Marilou Danley 62, the roommate of the Las Vegas shooter Stephen Paddock but Police Chief Lombardo said he didn’t think she was involved. Paddocks home in mesquite has also been located and an investigation is underway. Police urged families looking to locate missing loved ones to call 1-866-535-5654.
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