Paul Kirby, 38, left his seat at the Sunday service when he heard what sounded like the wall of the building exploding. Outside, he saw a man get out of his truck carrying what looked like an assault rifle.
All he could remember of that moment, Mr. Kirby said in an interview, was “extreme fear.”
The moment seemed to stretch out, he recalled, “just waiting for that hit.”
The man was 10 to 20 yards away.
Then he began shooting.
A bullet went through the glass door next to Mr. Kirby, he said, and a piece of shrapnel hit his leg as he turned to run back inside to find his wife and two children. The family ran out of the building and loaded as many fleeing people as they could into their car.
Mr. Kirby recalled that there were two people lying on the ground.
“I was afraid they were going to start shooting cars as we were leaving,” he said, dressed in the white shirt and tie that he had worn to church that morning. It was “the scaredest I’ve ever been.”
The scene at the Latter-day Saints meeting house in Grand Blanc Township, Mich., that was attacked on Sunday was harrowing for anyone who witnessed it.
Tony Deck, 56, knew something was wrong when he heard sirens racing by his house near the church. He drove to the scene, thinking that the cases of bottled water he already had in his truck might be useful. When he got there, he saw the building burning, and yellow tarps covering several shapes on the ground that appeared to be bodies.
He handed out water.
“Everybody needs to tone things down,” Mr. Deck said. “I really don’t care what you do, man, just respect humans.”
For Debbie Horkey, 74, the horror this time was unfolding literally in her backyard.
Ms. Horkey has a clear view of the church parking lot from the back window of her condo. On Sunday morning, she said, she and her husband heard screaming and gunshots coming from the direction of the building. One woman, she said, was “just yelling for help.”
Ms. Horkey said she was enraged. She was also shaking.
Scott Atkinson and Sophia Lada contributed reporting from Grand Blanc, Mich.
Amy Harmon covers how shifting conceptions of gender affect everyday life in the United States.
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