David Hogg survived the worst day of his life, but 17 others died of ragged AK-47 gunshot blasts that tore through their bodies. The young man was passionate about what had happened as he stood outside of his school, Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida. He remained standing into the night with police blocking the street to the high school.
The student’s voice demanded action, the BBC reported :
‘I feel a mix of anger, sadness, but mostly passion. I don’t want this to ever happen to anyone else again. The fact is there are 17 families that now have empty rooms…These are people’s kids. They’ve poured all the love, everything they could ever get, into these kids. And it’s all been taken by one piece of metal, and bled out onto the floor.’
David heard the first shots when he was in his science class, near the end of the school day. He has been a tribute to his father, a former FBI agent. After his son called him, the man told him to stay calm. Other students phoned their parents, telling them they love them, actually telling them goodbye.
The teacher had shut the door when the fire alarm sounded. The BBC reported that David said:
‘We instinctively walked outside. We thought it was a drill.’
It was not. As David walked with his class he saw a “tsunami” of people running in their direction. They all followed the runners. It seems, though, that they sadly had chosen to run right into the shooter’s path. David said:
‘Some of my classmates did not know if they were leaving the school alive.’
Two students who attend Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School describe the “chaos” after a shooting at their school in Florida in which at least 17 people were killed https://t.co/ggiqhgSNfG pic.twitter.com/yg2NbFbZp1
— CNN (@CNN) February 15, 2018
David commended an “heroic janitor:”
‘”A very heroic janitor stopped us,” says David. He said, “Don’t go that way – he (the shooter) is over there.”‘
The teacher responsible for the school’s culinary program, Ashley Kurth, directed the kids into her classroom. David continued his story:
‘Within 30 seconds she easily had 30 or 40 people in there. The lights were switched off.’
His younger sister also goes to Stoneman Douglas. The young man said:
‘I knew she was alive – at least in the beginning. I had a text from her, and a call. She was very frantic. I was petrified but I knew she was on the other side of the school (away from the shooter.) ‘There was a group energy that kept us strong. There was a melancholy calm.’
David is a student journalist, so he automatically began interviewing people around him, recording them on his phone:
‘I figured, if I died, at least this (the recording) would be passed on to other people, so these voices would echo on. I realized I may not survive. It was going through everybody’s minds at some point.’
After about an hour, five members of a SWAT team came into the room and told the students to get down and put their hands in the air.
‘At this time, they hadn’t eradicated the suspect. We didn’t know that, but they didn’t have him. We were quite frankly running for our lives.’
After he reached a secure location, David said he felt “shock – pure shellshock.” He united with his father and his sister. Unfortunately, one of his sister’s friends died of a gunshot wound in the massacre. The young man was adamant:
“This scourge of school shooting after school shooting. It only happens here not because of coincidence…but as a consequence of our inaction.’
Sen. @ChrisMurphyCT lashes out at colleagues over inaction on gun control after Florida high school shooting. https://t.co/x6M0ri9j4Q pic.twitter.com/7r5Ee9N4Nk
— CBS News (@CBSNews) February 15, 2018
Featured Image via ABC News Twitter page.