Lifesaving school lockdown
A LOCKDOWN at an elementary school saved lives during a terrifying attack Tuesday in a small town in Northern California, authorities said.
Officials at Rancho Tehama Elementary School initiated the lockdown at the school as soon as shots by gunman Kevin Neal were heardfroma quarter-mile away.
“I really, truly believe we would have had a horrific bloodbath at that school if that school hadn’t taken the action that it did,” Tehama County Assistant Sheriff Phil Johnston said.
No children died at the school, andjustonewaswounded.
Neal shot his wife to death Monday and killed four people in a spree Tuesday. He then riddled many of the school’s portable classrooms with bullets before trying repeatedly to get into a class- room where more than a dozen kindergarten students cowered inside. Neal “tried and tried and tried and tried to get into the kindergarten door,” but it was locked, said Randy Morehouse, the district’s operations head.
Emergency lockdown drills have become a regular part of student life, especially since the ColumbineHigh Schoolmassacre in Colorado in 1999 that left 13 deadand the SandyHook Elementary School shooting in Connecticut that left 26 dead.
During lockdowns, students and staff go to designated rooms and lock all doors and windows. They’re instructed to be quiet, to turn off the lights and to stay away from windows.New York State law requires schools to complete at least four lockdown drills a year.