11/5/2009 2:03:00 PM
UPDATE: Fort Hood shooting suspect unconscious and on a ventilator, but 'death is not imminent'
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| Rodolfo Gonzalez, Austin American-Statesman/The Associated Press
Army Lt. Gen. Robert Cone gives a news conference after a shooting in Fort Hood, Texas, on Thursday. |
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| Jerry Larson, The Waco Tribune-Herald/The Associated Press
Staff Sgt. Fanuaee Fea, 32, comforts Savannah Green, 23, outside the main gate after a shooting at Fort Hood, Texas on Thursday.
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| | Mass shootings in recent years | Nov. 5, 2009: The Army says 12 people were killed and 31 wounded in a shooting rampage at its Fort Hood base in Texas. Army officials initially said the suspected gunman was among the dead, but later said he survived and was hospitalized.
April 3, 2009: A 41-year-old man opened fire at an immigrant community center in Binghamton, N.Y., killing 11 immigrants and two workers. Jiverly Wong, a Vietnamese immigrant and a former student at the center, killed himself as police rushed to the scene.
March 10, 2009: Michael McLendon, 28, killed 10 people, including his mother, four other relatives and the wife and child of a local sheriff's deputy, across two rural Alabama counties. He then committed suicide.
Feb. 14, 2008: Former student Steven Kazmierczak, 27, opened fire in a lecture hall at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, fatally shooting five students and wounding 18 others before committing suicide.
Dec. 5, 2007: 19-year-old Robert A. Hawkins opened fire with a rifle in Omaha, Neb., at a Von Maur store in the Westroads Mall, killing eight people before taking his own life. Five more people were wounded, two critically.
April 16, 2007: Cho Seung-Hui, 23, fatally shot 32 people in a dorm and a classroom at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, then killed himself in the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history.
Feb. 12, 2007: 18-year-old Sulejman Talovic killed five and wounded four at the Trolley Square mall in Salt Lake City, Utah. He was then shot and killed by police.
Oct. 2, 2006: Charles Carl Roberts IV, 32, shot to death five girls at West Nickel Mines Amish School in Pennsylvania, then killed himself.
March 21, 2005: 16-year-old student Jeffrey Weise killed nine people, including his grandfather and his grandfather's companion at home, and then five fellow students, a teacher and a security guard at Red Lake High School in Red Lake, Minnesota, before killing himself. Seven students were wounded.
March 12, 2005: Terry Ratzmann, 44, gunned down members of his congregation as they worshipped at the Brookfield Sheraton in Brookfield, Wisconsin, slaying seven and wounding four before killing himself.
July 29, 1999: Former day trader Mark Barton, 44, killed nine people in shootings at two Atlanta, Georgia, brokerage offices, then committed suicide.
April 20, 1999: Students Eric Harris, 18, and Dylan Klebold, 17, opened fire at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, killing 12 classmates and a teacher and wounding 26 others before committing suicide in the school's library.
March 24, 1998: Andrew Golden, 11, and Mitchell Johnson, 13, killed four girls and a teacher at a Jonesboro, Arkansas, middle school. 10 others were wounded in the shooting.
October 16, 1991: George Hennard, 35, smashed his pickup truck through a Luby's Cafeteria window in Killeen, Texas, and fired on the lunchtime crowd with a high-powered pistol, killing 22 people. At least 20 others were wounded.
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By APRIL CASTRO and DEVLIN BARRETT
The Associated Press
FORT HOOD, Texas (AP) - An Army psychiatrist set to be shipped overseas opened fire at the Fort Hood Army post Thursday, authorities said, a rampage that killed 12 people and left 31 wounded in the worst mass shooting ever at a military base in the United States.
The gunman, first said to have been killed, was wounded but alive in a hospital under military guard, said Lt. Gen. Bob Cone at Fort Hood. He was shot four times, and was on a ventilator and unconscious, according to military officials. "I would say his death is not imminent," Cone said.
The man was identified as Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, a 39-year-old from Virginia.
President Barack Obama called the shooting at the Soldier Readiness Center, where soldiers who are about to be deployed or who are returning undergo medical screening, "a horrific outburst of violence."
"It's difficult enough when we lose these brave Americans in battles overseas," the commander in chief said. "It is horrifying that they should come under fire at an Army base on American soil."
There was no official word on motive. Hasan had transferred to Fort Hood in July from Walter Reed Medical Center, where he received a poor performance evaluation, according to an official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the case publicly.
Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, said generals at Fort Hood told her that Hasan was about to deploy overseas. Retired Col. Terry Lee, who said he had worked with Hasan, told Fox News he was being sent to Afghanistan.
Lee said Hasan had hoped Obama would pull troops out of Afghanistan and Iraq and got into frequent arguments with others in the military who supported the wars.
Faizul Khan, a former imam at a mosque Hasan attended in Silver Spring, Md., said he spoke often with Hasan about how Hasan wanted to find a wife. Hasan was a lifelong Muslim and attended prayers regularly, often in his Army uniform, Khan said.
The shooter used two pistols, one of them semiautomatic. Neither were military-issued, Danner said.
Video from the scene showed police patrolling the area with handguns and rifles, ducking behind buildings for cover. Sirens could be heard wailing while a woman's voice on a public-address system urged people to take cover.
"I was confused and just shocked," said Spc. Jerry Richard, 27, who works at the center but was not on duty during the shooting. "Overseas you are ready for it. But here you can't even defend yourself."
Soldiers at Fort Hood don't carry weapons unless they are doing training exercises.
The Rev. Greg Schannep was about to head into a graduation ceremony when a man in uniform approached him, warning him that someone had opened fire. Schannep heard three volleys of gunfire and saw people running.
"There was a burst of shots and more bursts of shots and people running everywhere," said Schannep, who works for local Congressman John Carter.
The uniformed man who had warned him ran to the theater. Schannep said he could see the man's back was bloodied from a wound. The man survived, was treated and will be fine, Schannep said.
Cone said initially three people were held, and all have been interviewed. Authorities believe, however, that there was a single shooter.
The Soldier Readiness Center holds hundreds of people and is one of the most populated parts of the base, said Steve Moore, a spokesman for III Corps at Fort Hood. Nearby there are barracks and a food center where there are fast food chains.
The wounded were dispersed among hospitals in central Texas, Cone said. Their identities, and the identities of the dead, were not immediately released.
Amber Bahr, 19, was shot in the stomach but was in stable condition, said her mother, Lisa Pfund of Random Lake, Wis.
"We know nothing, just that she was shot in the belly," Pfund told The Associated Press. She couldn't provide more details and only spoke with emergency personnel.
Hasan, whose family said he was born in suburban Washington, is single with no children. He graduated from Virginia Tech, where he was a member of the ROTC and earned a bachelor's degree in biochemistry in 1997. He received his medical degree from the military's Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Md., in 2001 and was at Walter Reed for six years for his internship, residency and a fellowship.
"We are shocked and saddened by the terrible events at Fort Hood today," his cousin, Nadar Hasan, said in a statement issued on behalf of their family. "We send the families of the victims our most heartfelt sympathies."
The attack happened just down the road from one of the worst mass shootings in U.S. history. On Oct. 16, 1991, George Hennard smashed his pickup truck through a Luby's Cafeteria window in Killeen, Texas, and fired on the lunchtime crowd with a high-powered pistol, killing 22 people and wounding at least 20 others.
No other shooting at a military base in the U.S. has been anywhere near as deadly as Thursday's. In 1993, a gunman at Fort Knox shot five civilian co-workers, killing three, and then fatally shot himself.
Around the country, some bases stepped up security precautions, but no others were locked down.
Covering 339 square miles, Fort Hood is the largest active duty armored post in the United States. Home to about 52,000 troops as of earlier this year, it is located halfway between Austin and Waco.
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Posted: Friday, November 06, 2009
Article comment by:
Putin
30 million Russians died in World War II to protect Russia not America. Granted most of europe would be speaking German but Germany had no foothold to attack the USA. Besides whats your point exactly?
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My point is exactly above.
Hit your books.You have obviously never heard of Pearl Harbor.If the U.S. did not nuke Japan You would not be around today. However the U.S. does not have the capabilities it had 60 years ago.The superpower status is gone forever.
Imagine that Chinese today will decide to demand money you own them?And use their military...and maybe ask Russians and let's say India to help out.
Good Luck.
The U.S. military is in a sad state and this incident just proves it.Hopefully Americans will start taking care of their own people within it's borders and stop making a fools of themselves here and in the rest of the world.
Posted: Friday, November 06, 2009
Article comment by:
Debbie G
My daughter in law was on the base at that time and is safe. Instead of turning this into a political debate how about praying for the families who lost there loved ones!!!!!!
Posted: Friday, November 06, 2009
Article comment by:
We have a problem we need to address and quit ignoring
The major is reported to have been giving away his belongings along with copies of the Koran over the past several days and was yelling "God is Great" in Arabic when he started shooting. Assuming both are true and they sure seem to be, the argument about motives is clearly over to any reasonable person. His motives are pretty darn clear and are directly related in his religion. At some point, we need to put keeping Americans safe at least slightly ahead of political correctness and people need to stop making excuses for this kind of behavior such as he was sometimes harrassed at work - notice it is always soomething that can never be verified. The major never reported any harrassment of any kind.
Posted: Friday, November 06, 2009
Article comment by:
Parker Anderson
Putin and Patriot, can it. This is not the time or place for this kind of babbling.
Posted: Friday, November 06, 2009
Article comment by:
None
Let's see, Nidal Malik Hasan. Barak Hussein Obama II. Me thinks I see a trend here.
Posted: Friday, November 06, 2009
Article comment by:
Former Sheepdog
Putin; 30 million Russians died so THEY wouldn't speak German today. Seems a 15 yr old kid playing the video game Call of Duty 5 knows more about WWII logistics than you apparently do.
And for those hand-wringing over the unfair assumptions that all Muslims are terrorists; of course any rational person would realize they aren't.
However, I worked for the Dept of Homeland Security from 2002 to 2004 and have maintained many contacts in that field.
Most of the info I had/have access to was classified, but I can assure you that while most Muslims are not involved in terrorism, they have a very high tolerance of it.
Posted: Friday, November 06, 2009
Article comment by:
No name provided
30 million Russians died in World War II to protect Russia not America. Granted most of europe would be speaking German but Germany had no foothold to attack the USA.
Besides whats your point exactly?
Posted: Friday, November 06, 2009
Article comment by:
Patriot
Hey "putin" Your other comments Just prove everything I said and every one else wrote about you. Keep on digging your hole and showing how ignorant you really are.
Posted: Friday, November 06, 2009
Article comment by:
Putin
30 million Russians died in WW2 so You don't speak German today.Did you say thank you to your Russian American neighbour today?
Posted: Friday, November 06, 2009
Article comment by:
Disgusted
His name was Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan?! SAY NO MORE!! MAKES PERFECT SENSE!!
Posted: Friday, November 06, 2009
Article comment by:
No name provided
Putin; 12 Americans were killed today and you use it as an excuse to promote government health care??
Do any liberals actually have a soul anymore?
You should be ashamed of yourself.
Posted: Friday, November 06, 2009
Article comment by:
Stephen
Okay so based on the logic of the majority of posters all Muslims are terrorists? Who said I was sided with anyone; if I chose any side it was the side of rationality instead of jumping to conclusions. Also if you are profiling a person based on whether they are a Muslim or not it is not racial profiling... race has no factor in one's religion. However it is nice to know people associate darker skin tones with one religion or another. I pray (in the secular sense) for resolution in this atrocity and for rational behavior in the face of irrational actions.
Posted: Thursday, November 05, 2009
Article comment by:
Tim
Medical care caused a madman to kill innocent people? Are you serious? Does anybody care about the people killed? Whatever the beliefs this man was in the military willingly"to serve his country."
Posted: Thursday, November 05, 2009
Article comment by:
Putin
To Patriot:There is enough of talking heads in this country.If you feel so patriotic there is a plenty avenues to prove it instead spending your time creating cliches we are all so used to these days.with your attitude Americans will be dying with a simple viruses in their own backyards.
Posted: Thursday, November 05, 2009
Article comment by:
Putin
Please.I am not local nor liberal.
I have lived through different systems and some 5 decades I can make a fairly correct assesment.
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