As students scrambled to escape gunfire at California's Saugus High School Thursday morning during a shooting that left two students dead and three injured, one student immediately called police.
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Hannah Schooping said as soon as she heard the gunshots, she and some friends rushed away from the Santa Clarita school.
“We all raced out and then while we’re racing out, we heard three more gunshots behind us, and the scariest part is that you don’t know where they are coming from and we had to run…,” Schooping told KCBS. “I called 911. ... My hands were shaking and I was trying to keep it together because everyone else was losing it.”
Schooping added that she couldn’t believe what she was telling police.
“I don’t know how anything like this could happen,” she said.
Some students ran to nearby houses during the attack. Larry Everhart, a grandfather to a student at the high school, told KCBS he saw students running and screaming as he was leaving his home.
”They were saying, 'Can I come in your house?' It was about 20 of them. I wanted to make sure they were safe, so I got them in there," he said. He later reunited with his granddaughter.
The shooting began at the school when a student, who has been identified as Nathaniel Berhow, opened fire with a .45 caliber handgun in the “quad area” around 7:30 a.m, according to the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Office. Berhow then turned the gun on himself, leaving himself “gravely” injured, police said. He remains in critical condition, according to reports.
Authorities initially thought the 16-year-old had fled after the shooting and other local schools were put on lockdown, while people were asked to stay inside.
It was the suspected shooter’s 16th birthday and the entire attack was only 16 seconds, authorities said. A 16-year-old and 14-year-old were shot and later died at the hospital. Three other students, who were also shot, were hospitalized as well.
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