On the morning of Oct. 1, an assailant open fire on Umpqua Community College, outside of Roseburg, Oregon. The 20 year old man, yet to be identified in reports, managed to shoot and kill at least 13 people and seriously injure over 20 more, before being taken out by police in a firefight. This incident marks the first mass causality incident at an American school this year, after over 40 school shooting reports, and the second school shooting in the Roseburg area in a decade (the other incident was at Roseburg High School in 2006, in which a freshman student shot a classmate).
Reports state the shooting started in one classroom, where the assailant opened fire, forced student to the ground ask asked about their religious beliefs before his victims managed to bust out of the room. The school was not properly equipped for this kind of attack, with having only one unarmed security officer on duty at a time.
It is believed that the assailant posted about his plan on his social media account. One post in particular read, “This is the only time I’ll ever be in the news. I’m so insignificant.” Another post made reference to the UC Santa Barbara shooter from 2014. Other posters actually encouraged him, giving insight on how to do it and on what weapons to use.
There has yet to be any report in what weapon was used or possible motives, other than investigators have recovered four firearms, three pistols and one rifle, believed to belong to the assailant.
For the fifteen time in his administration, President Obama addressed the nation that evening about a mass shooting. “Somehow this has become routine,” the president spoke, “The reporting is routine. My response here at this podium ends up being routine. The conversation in the aftermath of it. We’ve become numb to this. We talked about this after Columbine, and Blacksburg, after Tuscon, after Newtown, after Charleston. It cannot be this easy for somebody who wants to inflict harm on other people to get his or her hands on a gun.”
An on-campus shooting should not now, nor ever, be a part of the “college experience”.
