Shooting in Uvalde: This was the shooting at the Texas elementary school that left 21 dead

The day began like any other in Uvalde, with the daily hustle and bustle of a humble town with a Latino majority near the United States border with Mexico.

Until Tuesday at noon, this locality to more than 48 kilometers from San Antonio, in Texas, was hardly known.

It made the news at times because of the migrant caravans that crossed from the south, but in general, it was considered a quiet and close-knit community.

Now it is the stage of the worst massacre that occurred in a school in the United States in almost a decade.

At least 21 Dead people (19 of them children and two teachers) when an adolescent from 18 years broke into the first aria Robb with a handgun and an AK-rifle, barricaded himself in a classroom and began to shoot.

One day after the event, new details begin to appear about how the day that changed the life of this border town took place.

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One sunny morning

It was a day that began with a sunny morning and ended with a stormy night.

Around 08: 00 local time, near the center of the city of Uvalde, about 600 students between seven and 10 years arrived at Robb Elementary School.

School buses approached the door, while other students said goodbye to their parents in their cars, some without knowing that they would never see each other again.

Summer vacations are they were fast approaching: there were barely two days of school left and many students were already receiving their diplomas and end-of-year awards.

Sometime that morning, shots rang out on the other side of town.

Salvador Ramos, a teenager described as “lonely”, with a “tense home life”, thin, with a speech impediment (which according to some of his classmates led him to be teased at school) shot his grandmother from 48 years for reasons that are still unclear.

The authorities said that he shot the old woman in the face, who managed to call the police.

According to the Texas governor on Thursday, Greg Abbot, shortly before Ramos had written his intentions on Facebook.

“I’m going to shoot my grandmother.” “I am going to shoot up an elementary school,” he wrote, according to the governor.

In a post on Twitter, an official from Meta, the company behind Facebook, indicated that Ramos’s messages had not been public, but sent by private message to another person half an hour before the attack.

The attacker had 12 years.

Wearing a bulletproof vest, similar to the one used by United States special troops, he climbed on an old dark-colored van and went to the Robb school without anyone knowing why yet.

He drove erratically through the city until he crashed his car into a ditch near the elementary school.

Some passers-by came up to offer help.

“People thought I was in trouble, so i ran They came to help him and he got out of his vehicle and started shooting at them,” a witness told the Telemundo network.

Governor Abbot said that, after leaving his car on the side of the road, he broke into at school.

It is not clear how he managed to sneak in.

At a press conference this Wednesday, Steve McCraw, director of the Texas Department of Public Safety, said that the agents guarding the school tried to “confront” the attacker, but there are questions about the resistance they offered.

The entrance

It was 02: 32 local time when Ramos snuck into the school and began his killing spree, which lasted about 45 minutes.

“He shot and killed in a horrible, incomprehensible manner,” Abbott recounted.

A video shared on social networks shows a person dressed in black running towards a side door of the school with what appears to be a rifle.

Texas — The car that believe the attacker was driving, inside a ditch.

The authorities told this Thursday that last week, shortly after completing the 18 years, Ramos he had bought two semi-automatic rifles, as well as hundreds of ammunition.

It is believed that the young man showed a photo of the rifles on an Instagram account that authorities believe was hers and that she was suspended after the massacre.

Texas Department of Public Safety spokesman Chris Olivarez told CNN that the attacker entered the rza in a fourth grade classroom, where he opened fire.

“He barricaded himself in a classroom and started shooting at the children and teachers who were inside,” he said.

All the victims of the shooting were found in that classroom.

Chaos and confusion

Witnesses told US television stations that they had seen children climbing through windows or seeking refuge in a nearby funeral home when the shooting began.

Others, led by two teachers, escaped from the building and hid behind some trees at the back of the school.

Elisha Mata, whose nephew was at the center, told the New York Times that school staff turned off the lights and told everyone to shut up.

On Tuesday night several families received the news that their children had died.

Marcela Cabralez, a local church pastor, told the Washington Post that her nine-year-old granddaughter was having lunch with other students when she heard a loud noise coming from outside, including gunshots and broken glass.

The teachers led the children behind a curtain, where they all hid, desperately trying to avoid attracting the attention of the shooter.

Cabralez’s granddaughter hid in a bathroom.

Adolfo Hernández told the New York Times that his nephew had been in a classroom nearby from where the shooting occurred.

“In fact, he witnessed his little friend being shot in the face,” he stated.

The friend, he said, “was shot in the nose and just fell. My nephew was devastated”.

Entrenched

Border Patrol agents, the main security force in Uvalde due to its proximity to the border, were the first to arrive on the scene .

Ramos, entrenched in the classroom, also began to shoot at the guards.

“ Border Patrol Agents responded to a law enforcement request for assistance in an active shooter situation inside Robb Elementary School in Uvalde,” Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman Marsha (Catron) Espinosa tweeted.

“Upon entering the building, the agents were shot by the subject, who was entrenched,” he added.

Espinosa reported that the agents stood “between the shooter and the children on the scene to divert the shooter’s attention from potential victims and save lives.”

Travis Considine, spokesman for the Texas Department of Public Safety, reported that two police officers were injured, one of them in the head, although his life was not in danger.

The AP agency reported that the massacre was contained when an agent Border Patrol “ran into the school without waiting for reinforcements and shot and killed the gunman.”

US media reported that Ramos was shot in the head.

Horror scenes

Later seven ammunition magazines from were found in the school rounds.

The children were rushed to a local community center more than a kilometer away.

Several witnesses reported seeing several teachers and children come out crying wounded or wounded.

“We saw a girl covered in blood and the parents were screaming, it was an ugly scene,” Derek told the Washington Post Sotelo, a resident who runs a local auto repair shop.

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The shooting was followed by frantic scenes as parents came to school seeking news of their children.

Journalists at the scene described the moments of panic when some received the news that their children were dead.

Ángel Garza was one of them.

Shortly after the shooting he wrote on Facebook that he was desperate for news of his daughter Amerie, from 08 years.

In a later post, he reported what had happened

“My little love is now flying high with the angels . Please don’t take a second for granted. Hug your family. Tell them you love them”, he wrote.

Amerie Garza lost her life shortly after receive an honors diploma at your school.

Other parents have been left in the dark for hours. They were asked to provide DNA samples to help identify some of the victims.

Jesse Rodríguez told the San Antonio Express that he was still waiting for information on his daughter after hearing that she may have been taken to the hospital.

“I was waiting for more information. Nobody called me back”, he said.

The night

More Late as night fell in Uvalde, police stood guard in the pouring rain outside a community center where families had gathered to hear from their loved ones.

Just a few blocks from away, a small vigil was taking place, according to BBC journalists.

Karla Bowman’s voice broke when she told him the group the case of a family friend whose little daughter, a student at the school, was among the disappeared.

“They don’t know if she is in surgery or one of the dead, but you know it’s a v victim of some sort because she’s missing,” a tearful Bowman said. “I can not believe it”.