Kentucky school shooting leaves 2 dead

WASHINGTON (AFP) — A teenage boy opened fire with a handgun at a Kentucky high school early Tuesday, killing two fellow students and wounding more than a dozen people in the latest mass shooting to hit the US.

The unnamed 15-yearold student, now in custody, is alleged to have carried out the attack at Marshall County High School in Benton, a small town in western Kentucky.

Two students of the same age died of gunshot wounds, while 13 other people were shot and five suffered other injuries during the shooting, Kentucky State Police said, adding that those hurt ranged in age from 14 to 18 years old.

The students ran silently, too stunned to shout. Some of the children ran into classrooms to hide from the boy with the gun. Some ran out of the building, into the fields, across the streets, through the doors of nearby businesses.

“No one screamed,” said 16-year-old Alexandria Caporali, recounting the moment her high school became the site of the latest American mass shooting. “It was almost completely silent as people just ran,” she said.

Caporali was eating breakfast when she heard a shot, turned and saw the teenager with the gun. She knew him as a quiet boy who played music and always seemed happy. After the first shot, he seemed to hesitate.

In the same room, two 16 year olds, Lexie Waymon and Baleigh Culp, had been laughing and talking about makeup and the homecoming basketball game like ordinary teenagers on an ordinary morning.

They heard a bang, and imagined something equally ordinary, like a heavy book hitting the floor.

”That’s what I expected it to be,” Culp said. “Until I saw a body drop on the ground and the bangs continued. There was bullets flying everywhere.”

Fear momentarily seized Waymon.

”I couldn’t move. I got up and tried to run, but I fell. I heard someone hit the ground. It was so close to me,” Waymon said.

She froze, she said. She could see only blackness.

Then Waymon ran and did not stop running, even though her chest hurt. One phrase ran on repeat through her mind: “I can’t believe this is happening. I cannot believe this is happening.”