Canada was reeling on Wednesday, a day after a shooter killed nine people and injured 25 others in a remote town in northeastern British Columbia, the third-deadliest shooting in the country’s history, which comes amid a wider debate about gun control.
Seven people were found dead in Tumbler Ridge Secondary School, including the person believed to be the shooter, who died from what appeared to be a self-inflicted injury, according to Superintendent Ken Floyd of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Two other people were found dead in a local residence that the police believed to be connected to the shooting.
Another person died while being transported from the school to the hospital, and 25 people suffered injuries that were not life-threatening, the police said in a statement.
Mass killings are rare in Canada, but the attack in Tumbler Ridge, population 2,400, was the second deadly incident in British Columbia in less than a year after a man drove a car into a crowd last April.
The police have not released the shooter’s identity, details about the firearms used or how they were obtained. Superintendent Floyd said the suspected shooter was the same person mentioned in a police alert around 1:20 p.m. local time, which described the person as a “female in a dress with brown hair.”
The police have not identified the victims or provided their ages, because officers are still notifying their families, Premier David Eby of British Columbia said in a news briefing. Students hid for hours inside the school while the shooting unfolded.
On Tuesday afternoon, Stacie Gruntman, the principal, directed students and teachers to lock down their classrooms, about two minutes after a student reported hearing gunshots on campus, said Jarbas Noronha, the school’s wood and auto mechanic shop teacher.
In the auto mechanic shop with 15 students, Mr. Noronha locked the hallway door and two garage doors that led to the school yard. Two metal benches were used as barricades.
“We were in the safest part of the school,” he said in a phone interview on Tuesday night. “If someone tried to break in through the hallway door, we would run to the yard through the garage doors.”
Prime Minister Mark Carney of Canada said in a social media post that he was “devastated” by the shooting. His office said he would suspend plans to travel on Wednesday to the Munich Security Conference in Germany.
Residents of Tumbler Ridge were left shaken by the shootings. The town sits at the foothills of the Rocky Mountains and is surrounded by expansive mountain ranges and a geological park recognized by UNESCO, the United Nations cultural agency.
Fewer than 200 students are enrolled at the secondary school, according to the provincial government. The secondary school, the town’s elementary school and a local college were all closed for the rest of the week.
The fatal shootings in Tumbler Ridge came as Canada’s federal government faces hurdles in a national gun buyback program that has proved politically unpopular and a logistical quagmire.
In 2020, in response to the worst mass shooting in Canadian history — when a rampage by a man disguised as a Royal Canadian Mounted Police officer left 23 people dead — the federal government took steps to tighten the country’s already strict gun laws. Among the measures was a ban on 1,500 types of assault-style weapons that was later widened to include freezing handgun sales and expanding the list of banned firearms.
The buyback program for military-style assault rifles was also included, which has proved politically divisive and logistically challenging. There are roughly 1.3 million registered firearms in Canada, according to police data.
Francesca Regalado is a Times reporter covering breaking news.
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