Teen gunman kills 15 at Texas elementary school
An 18-year-old gunman killed 14 young children and a teacher at an elementary school in Texas on Tuesday, in the deadliest US school shooting in years.
The attack in Uvalde, Texas -- a small community about an hour from the Mexican border -- is the latest in a spree of deadly shootings in America, where horror at the cycle of gun violence has failed to spur enough action to end it.
Governor Greg Abbott, addressing a news conference, said the gunman was believed to have shot his grandmother before heading to Robb Elementary School at around noon, abandoning his vehicle and entering with a handgun, and possibly also a rifle.
"He shot and killed, horrifically and incomprehensibly, 14 students and killed a teacher," Abbott said.
The governor said the suspect, who he described as a local teenager and a US citizen, was also "deceased," adding that "it is believed that responding officers killed him."
Footage showed small groups of children weaving through parked cars and buses, some holding hands as they fled under police escort from the school, which teaches students aged around seven to 10 years old.
It was the deadliest such incident since 14 high school students and three adult staff were killed in Parkland, Florida in 2018 -- and the worst at an elementary school since the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting in Connecticut, in which 20 children and six staff were killed.
The White House ordered flags to be flown at half-staff in mourning for the victims.
