Austrians endure shock, horror after gunman kills 10 at school

GRAZ, Austria - Austrians were dumbfounded by grief and horror after a 21-year-old gunman killed 10 people in a high school shooting spree on the morning of June 10, unleashing a new kind of violence to the Alpine country unaccustomed to such slayings.

Parents of pupils, top government officials and local residents in the southern city of Graz were lost for words after the young man, who has not been named,

opened fire at the school where he had recently been a pupil

.

“Terrible. There’s nothing else to make of it, is there?” said Ms Monika Leiner, a 55-year-old IT consultant who lives near the school. “I’m a bit older, and I’ve seen quite a few things, but I can’t remember (a shooting with) so many deaths.”

Police said the man, armed with a shotgun and a pistol, acted alone. They are scouring his home and the internet for clues to why he opened fire on the school in Austria’s second city of Graz on June 10, before shooting himself in a bathroom.

He left a farewell note that did not reveal the motive for the attack, police said, adding that a pipe bomb found at his home was not functional.

Austrian newspaper Kronen Zeitung said officers found a farewell letter during a search of the suspect’s home.

The authorities said the man did not graduate from the school, and Austrian media published unconfirmed reports he had suffered from bullying.

Mr Franz Ruf, director general of public security, said investigations into the motive were moving swiftly.

“We don’t want to speculate at this point,” he told ORF on the night of June 10.

About 17 minutes elapsed between the first emergency calls received by police about shots being fired at the school and the scene being declared safe, Mr Ruf said.

Austrian police said victims were found both outside and inside the school, on various floors. About a dozen people were injured in the attack, some seriously.

The incident was hard to properly take in, said a religious studies teacher at the school, Mr Paul Nitsche, who left his classroom before the gunman tried to enter, and briefly saw him trying to shoot the lock off another door.

“This is something I couldn’t even imagine before,” he told national broadcaster ORF. “That’s what the situation was like as I ran down the stairwell. I thought to myself: ‘This wasn’t real’.”

The killings were the worst Austrian school shooting on record.

Austria has one of the most heavily armed civilian populations in Europe, says the Small Arms Survey, an independent research project. The attack sparked calls for its gun laws to be tightened, including one from Graz’s mayor.

Police said the guns used were in the suspect’s possession legally, and Mr Ruf said that while Austrian gun laws are strict, the case was being looked into. “If there are any loopholes, they need to be closed,” he said.

The government declared three days of national mourning and political parties cancelled upcoming events.

In the afternoon, people arrived to leave flowers and candles by the school.

President Alexander Van der Bellen said it was hard to express what the country was feeling.

"This horror cannot be put into words," he said.

Long queues also formed outside a blood donation centre in Graz.

“Today is a hard day for all of us in Graz. I’m here to (donate) my blood to help other people who need it,” 25-year-old Stephanie Koenig told Reuters.

Police cordoned off the school and few parents of pupils there have so far made their feelings public.

The mother of one pupil told state broadcaster ORF that her son had called her during the shooting.

“It’s impossible to grasp,” said the woman, who was not named by the broadcaster. “I was just happy that he was on the phone and that I could hear him. But now I keep thinking about how others are doing.”

“He just told me that he had to run out and that he’d hidden in the garden. Everything else is too much for me now, including everything else he said,” she added.

Ms Nola, a 21-year-old student and local resident, told Reuters a friend of one of her friends was among the victims.

“A friend of mine goes to that school. She found out that a friend of hers died,” she said. “She called me immediately afterwards in tears and said ‘Hannah is dead! Hannah is dead!’ and her parents were also beside themselves.” REUTERS