Updated: 9am, 26th May, 2022 (AEST)
United States
At least 19 students and a teacher have been killed at an elementary school in Texas.
The shooting occurred at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, about 135 kilometres west of San Antonio. The shooter, identified as 18-year-old Salvador Ramos from Uvalde, is believed to have been killed by a law enforcement officer, reported as a member of the US Border Patrol, at the scene. Ramos is also suspected of shooting his grandmother prior to the attack.
Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, seen in an image from December, 2021. PICTURE: Google Maps.
The shooter is believed to have been armed with a handgun, an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle and high-capacity magazines.
The teacher killed has been named in US media as Eva Mireles.
US President Joe Biden, having just arrived back in the US from a visit to Asia, called for greater action on gun control. “When in God’s name are we going to stand up to the gun lobby?”
Speaking from the White House, he said the idea that “an 18-year-old kid can walk into a store and buy two assault weapons is just wrong”.
“These kinds of mass shootings rarely happen anywhere else in the world.”
Biden said that to lose a child “is like having a piece of your soul ripped away”.
“There’s a hollowness in your chest, you feel like you’re going to be sucked into it and are never going to be able to get out…It’s never quite the same.”
Earlier, US Vice-President Kamala Harris said “enough is enough”.
“As a nation, we have to have the courage to take action, and understand the nexus between what makes for reasonable and sensible public policy, to ensure something like this never happens again.”
Local police said the shooting began at 11:32am on Tuesday.
