Ft Hood

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-04-2009
Ft Hood
13
Thu, 11-05-2009 - 3:22pm
MSNBC is reporting a shooting at Ft. Hood. 7 are dead, 12 are injured. One person captured, one on the loose. Supposedly, the shooters wore military uniforms. The PX is surrounded.

 



Opal

 

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iVillage Member
Registered: 03-30-2007
In reply to: mombitsy
Thu, 11-05-2009 - 3:42pm
My son's best friend is stationed there. He is trying to get a hold of him.
iVillage Member
Registered: 01-04-2009
In reply to: mombitsy
Thu, 11-05-2009 - 4:18pm
My older son has a friend from his high school years there. He's trying to reach him via Facebook and MySpace. I think he should just use the telephone.

 

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-30-2007
In reply to: mombitsy
Thu, 11-05-2009 - 4:42pm

My son called his friend. He answered the phone "I'm fine, I'm alive." He's on lock down. He didn't know anymore than what we know.

I worry about him almost as much as I worry about my own kids. Whew!

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-04-2009
In reply to: mombitsy
Thu, 11-05-2009 - 5:51pm
My son called, his friend, wife and daughter were off the base shopping at the time. That is why he hadn't heard from him through Facebook and MySpace. They were forced to communicate using text messages on their cellphones, and his friend figured he could get back on base later today, so they were going out to dinner. They had no details at all.

 

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-30-2002
In reply to: mombitsy
Thu, 11-05-2009 - 6:26pm

This is a terrible, terrible tragedy. Just awful. Loss of life when they are sent abroad is bad enough, but at home??? Ugh. I don't even have words to express my sadness.


http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_fort_hood_shooting


FORT HOOD, Texas – A soldier opened fire at a U.S. Army base in Fort Hood, Texas on Thursday, unleashing a stream of gunfire that left 12 people dead and 31 wounded. Authorities killed the gunman, and apprehended two other soldiers suspected in what appears to be the worst mass shooting at a U.S. military base.


The shooting began around 1:30 p.m., Lt. Gen. Bob Cone said at a news conference. He said all the casualties took place at the base's Soldier Readiness Center, where soldiers who are about to be deployed or who are returning undergo medical screening.


"It's a terrible tragedy. It's stunning," Cone said.


A law enforcement official identified the shooting suspect as Army Maj. Malik Nadal Hasan. The official said Hasan, believed to be in his late 30s, was killed after opening fire at the base. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the case publicly.


The official says investigators are trying to determine if Hasan was his birth name, or if he changed his name and converted to Islam at some point in his life.


Cone said the soldier used two handguns in the attack. It was not clear if the gunman had stopped to reload.


A graduation ceremony for soldiers who finished college courses while deployed was going on in an auditorium at the Readiness Center at the time of the shooting, said Sgt. Rebekah Lampam, a Fort Hood spokeswoman.


Greg Schanepp, U.S. Rep. John Carter's regional director in Texas, was representing Carter at the graduation, said John Stone, a spokesman for Carter, whose district includes the Army post.


Schanepp was at the ceremony when a soldier who had been shot in the back came running toward him and alerted him of the shooting, Stone said. The soldier told Schanepp not to go in the direction of the shooter, he said. Stone said he believes Schanepp was in the theater.


The base was locked down after the shootings. The wounded were dispersed among hospitals in central Texas, Cone said.


The shootings on the Texas military base stirred memories of other recent mass shootings in the United States, including 13 dead at a New York immigrant center in March, 10 killed during a gunman's rampage across Alabama in March and 32 killed in the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history at Virginia Tech in 2007.


Around the country, some bases stepped up security precautions, but no others were locked down.


"The bottom line for us is that we are increasing security at our gates because the threat hasn't yet been defined, and we're reminding our Marines to be vigilant in their areas of responsibility," said Capt. Rob Dolan, public affairs officer for the Marine Corps Air Station in Yuma, Ariz.


In Washington, President Barack Obama called the shooting "a horrific outburst of violence." He said it's a tragedy to lose a soldier overseas and even more horrifying when they come under fire at an Army base on American soil.


"We will make sure that we get answers to every single question about this horrible incident," the commander in chief said. "We are going to stay on this."


Covering 339 square miles, Fort Hood is the largest active duty armored post in the United States. Home to about 52,000 troops as of earlier this year, the sprawling base is located halfway between Austin and Waco.


About a mile from Fort Hood's east gate, Cynthia Thomas, director of Under the Hood Cafe, a local coffee shop and nonprofit military support center, has been calling soldiers and friends on the post to make sure they're OK.


"It's chaotic," Thomas said, as a SWAT team just drove by. "They're just saying that they're under attack they don't know what's going on. ... The phones are jammed. Everybody is calling family members and friends. Soldiers are running around with M-16s."

Fort Hood officially opened on Sept. 18, 1942, and was named in honor of Gen. John Bell Hood. It has been continuously used for armored training and is charged with maintaining readiness for combat missions.

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iVillage Member
Registered: 07-22-2008
In reply to: mombitsy
Thu, 11-05-2009 - 7:03pm
I am OUTRAGED!
iVillage Member
Registered: 07-22-2008
In reply to: mombitsy
Thu, 11-05-2009 - 8:12pm

Now I am OUTRAGED that this isn't even the number one post.

iVillage Member
Registered: 01-04-2009
In reply to: mombitsy
Thu, 11-05-2009 - 9:50pm

I think we're going to learn what the shooter's motives were, and maybe those motives have nothing to do with his lineage or religion. It seems that initial reports that the shooter was killed were inaccurate.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/11/05/texas.fort.hood.shootings/index.html

Officials: Fort Hood shootings suspect alive; 12 dead

November 5, 2009 9:38 p.m. EST

A solider suspected of fatally shooting 12 and wounding 31 at Fort Hood in Texas on Thursday is not dead as previously reported, Army Lt. Gen. Robert Cone said Thursday evening.

A civilian officer who was wounded in the incident shot the suspect, who is "in custody and in stable condition," Cone told reporters.

The suspect, who officials initially said was killed in the incident, was identified as Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, 39, a law enforcement source told CNN.

A graduate of Virginia Tech, Hasan is a psychiatrist who is licensed in Virginia and was practicing at Darnall Army Medical Center at Fort Hood, according to professional records. Previously, he worked at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

A federal official said Hasan is a U.S. citizen of Jordanian descent. Military documents show that Hasan was born in Virginia, and was never deployed outside the United States.

Hasan was scheduled to be deployed to Iraq "and appeared to be upset about that," Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, said.

"I think that there is a lot of investigation going on now into his background and what he was doing that was not known before," Hutchison said.

At least 10 of the dead were soldiers, Cone said.

The shooter had two weapons, both handguns, Cone said.>>>> full article at the link above

I believe that there will be serious interrogations of the killer in the future.

 

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
In reply to: mombitsy
Thu, 11-05-2009 - 10:36pm

We moved to the Killeen area in the early 90s when my DH had a subcontracting job there....it was shortly after the shootings at the Luv's (Love's ?) Restaurant happened.

 
iVillage Member
Registered: 07-22-2008
In reply to: mombitsy
Thu, 11-05-2009 - 10:46pm

My prayers and thoughts as well....having a tough time with this....my two nephews are to leave in january for afghanistan and i was worried about that....but this happens on our own soil? It didn't help watching our elementary kids practicing today for the Veteran's Day assembly tomorrow...AMAZING what they produce....very proud!


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