A Springfield, Oregon hospital, near where a mass shooting on a college campus left ten people dead, prepared for additional emergency medical personnel on Thursday (October 1) in order to handle the casualties it was expecting.
“We called in multiple extra resources, surgeons, emergency physicians, nursing and others. In the meantime, we’ve been preparing also outside the actual medical arena by helping support some of the families, by setting up family resources, lodging and areas for the children and the families, as well as pastoral care, so that we can help support these families in this difficult time,” said Hans Notenboom, the Medical Director of Sacred Heart Medical Center.
A gunman opened fire at Umpqua Community College, killing 10 people and wounding seven others before police shot him to death, authorities said, in the latest mass killing to rock an American campus.
Notenboom said the hospital had received three patients from the town of Roseburg where the shooting rampage took place. The three were all women between the ages of 18 and 34 he said, adding that he could not comment on their conditions at the time.
“This is kind of an ongoing process so we’ll learn more as time goes,” he said.
Oregon Governor Kate Brown said the suspect was a 20-year-old man who was slain in an exchange of gunfire with police in Snyder Hall at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg following the rampage shortly after 10:30 a.m. local time (1730 GMT).
The gunman was not immediately identified by authorities. CNN reported that three handguns and a “long gun” belonging to the shooter were recovered from the scene. (Reuters)