MANILA- "It just keeps on popping and popping."
What sounded like a firecracker at first turned out to be a fatal shooting at a food festival in California on Monday (Philippine time).
"It started out like, sounded like a firecracker and everybody backed out," Filipino-American Eric Regalado, who was at the Gilroy Garlic Festival, told ANC.
Regalado, who said he was around 2 tents away from the shooter, said he heard over 15 gunshots fired.
"That guy probably fired around more than 15 shots. It just keeps on popping and popping. It's like a random shootout," he said.
Regalado said he was in tears while the shootout was happening because he got separated from his sons.
All 3 went home safely but Regalado said his sons are "actually shaken" from the incident.
The Gilroy Police has reported multiple casualties from the shootout.
A local city councilman, Dion Bracco, told The New York Times three people were killed and 12 injured in the shooting on the last day of the Gilroy Garlic Festival, an annual three-day event south of San Jose. He did not know if the 12 injured included the three fatalities, the newspaper said.
One suspect was in custody, Bracco said.
"They don't know if there were more, so they have to treat it as an active situation," he told the newspaper. "We have police out here from as far away as San Jose."
NBC Bay Area had reported that ambulance crews were told 11 people were "down" after the shooting.
Local hospital officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Aerial footage showed the festival grounds apparently deserted but with many emergency and police vehicles on surrounding streets and police in bullet-proof gear.
"Be careful and safe!" U.S. President Donald Trump wrote on Twitter.
Footage uploaded to social media appeared to show festival attendees scattering in fear and confusion as loud popping sounds could be heard in the background.
"What's going on?" a woman can be heard asking on one video. "Who'd shoot up a garlic festival?"
California Governor Gavin Newsom said his office was monitoring the situation closely. "This is nothing short of horrific," Newsom wrote on Twitter.
Evenny Reyes, 13, told the San Jose Mercury News that at first she thought the gunfire was fireworks. But then she saw someone with a wounded leg.
"We were just leaving and we saw a guy with a bandana wrapped around his leg because he got shot," Reyes told the newspaper. "There was a little kid hurt on the ground. People were throwing tables and cutting fences to get out."
Another witness, Maximo Rocha, a volunteer with the Gilroy Browns youth football team, said he saw many people on the ground, but could not be sure how many may have been shot and how many were trying to protect themselves.
He told NBC Bay Area that "quite a few" were injured, "because I helped a few."
One video posted on Twitter showed a blood-spattered woman sitting in the back of a semi-trailer and telling a man she had been shot in the hand.
Stage hand Shawn Viaggi told the Mercury News he heard gunshots and saw bullets hitting the ground. "I called out, 'It's a real gun, let's get out of here,' and we hid under the stage," Viaggi told the newspaper, adding that he saw police officers trying to resuscitate one man.
Founded in 1979, the Gilroy Garlic Festival features food, drink, live entertainment and cooking competitions. It says it is hosted by volunteers and describes itself as the world's greatest summer food festival.
It was being held at the outdoor Christmas Hill Park, where weapons of any kind are prohibited, according to the event's website.
To provide a safe, family-friendly atmosphere, it said, entry was refused to anyone wearing clothing or paraphernalia indicating membership in a gang, including a motorcycle club.
Festival officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment. With a report by Reuters
source: news.abs-cbn.com
Four people have died at a California food festival shooting, including a suspected gunman, police chief Scott Smithee told a news conference late on Sunday.
Fifteen more were injured, including some who suffered gunshot wounds, although the number of those shot was not immediately clear.
"It's just incredibly sad and disheartening that at an event that does so much good the community had to suffer from a tragedy like this," said Smithee, chief of police in the city of Gilroy, near San Jose.
The gunman appeared to have cut through a fence to get into the annual Garlic Festival. He may have had one accomplice, Smithee added. (Reporting by Rich McKay and Sharon Bernstein; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)
source: news.abs-cbn.com
* Shooting took place during country music festival
* Police say shooter acted alone, no militant links
* Gunman killed, police searching for female associate (Updates death toll)
LAS VEGAS - At least 50 people were killed and hundreds hurt when a 64-year-old gunman armed with more than 10 rifles opened fire on a Las Vegas country music festival on Sunday night, raining down bullets from a 32nd-floor window for several minutes before killing himself.
The death toll, which police emphasized was preliminary, would make the mass shooting the deadliest in U.S. history, eclipsing last year's massacre of 49 people at an Orlando night club by a gunman who pledged allegiance to Islamic State militants.
About 22,000 people were in the crowd when a man police identified as Stephen Paddock opened fire from a room in the Mandalay Bay hotel, causing concertgoers to panic, some trampling on others as law enforcement officers scrambled to find the gunman.
Shocked concertgoers, some with blood on their clothing, wandered the streets afterwards.
Police said they had no information about Paddock's motive, that he had no criminal record and was not believed to be connected to any militant group. Paddock, of Mesquite, Nevada, killed himself before police entered the hotel room he was firing from, Clark County Sheriff Joseph Lombardo told reporters.
"We have no idea what his belief system was," Lombardo said.
Two senior U.S. government officials told Reuters that Paddock's name was not on any database of suspected terrorists and that there was no evidence linking him to any international militant group.
One of the two U.S. officials discounted a claim of responsibility that was made by Islamic State. There was reason to believe that Paddock had a history of psychological problems, the official said.
In its claim, Islamic State said that the gunman was a recent convert, according to the group's news agency Amaq. Its claim did not include the gunman's name and showed no proof. In the past, the group has also claimed responsibility for attacks without providing evidence.
Lombardo said there were more than 10 rifles in the room where Paddock killed himself. He had checked into the hotel on Thursday.
Police found several weapons when they searched Paddock's home, in a retirement community in Mesquite, Nevada, about 90 miles (145 km) northeast of Las Vegas, Mesquite police spokesman Quinn Averett told reporters.
The dead included one off-duty police officer, Lombardo said. Two on-duty officers were injured, including one who was in stable condition after surgery and one who sustained minor injuries, Lombardo said. Police warned the death toll may rise.
U.S. President Donald Trump offered his condolences to the victims via a post on Twitter.
"My warmest condolences and sympathies to the victims and families of the terrible Las Vegas shooting. God bless you!" said Trump.
'JUST KEPT GOING ON'
Video of the attack showed panicked crowds fleeing as sustained rapid gunfire ripped through the area.
"People were just dropping to the ground. It just kept going on," said Steve Smith, a 45-year-old visitor from Phoenix, Arizona, who had flown in for the concert. He said the gunfire went on for an extended period of time.
"Probably 100 shots at a time," Smith said. "It would sound like it was reloading and then it would go again."
Las Vegas's casinos, nightclubs and shopping draw some 3.5 million visitors from around the world each year and the area was packed with visitors when the shooting broke out shortly after 10 p.m. local time (0400 GMT).
Shares of U.S. casino operators fell in morning trading on Wall Street, with MGM Resorts International, which owns the Mandalay Bay, down 3.5 percent. Melco Resorts & Entertainment Ltd, Wynn Resorts Ltd and Las Vegas Sands Corp were little changed.
Mike McGarry, a financial adviser from Philadelphia, was at the concert when he heard hundreds of shots ring out.
"It was crazy - I laid on top of the kids. They're 20. I'm 53. I lived a good life," McGarry said. The back of his shirt bore footmarks, after people ran over him in the panicked crowd.
The shooting broke out on the final night of the three-day Route 91 Harvest festival, a sold-out event featuring top acts such as Eric Church, Sam Hunt and Jason Aldean.
"Tonight has been beyond horrific," Aldean said in a statement on Instagram. "It hurts my heart that this would happen to anyone."
'WE'RE HORRIFIED'
The suspected shooter's brother, Eric Paddock, said the family was stunned.
"We have no idea. We're horrified. We're bewildered and our condolences go out to the victims," Eric Paddock said in a brief telephone interview, his voice trembling. "We have no idea in the world."
As with previous U.S. mass shootings, the incident sparked anger among advocates for gun control. The Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution protects the right to bear arms, and gun-rights advocates staunchly defend that provision.
"It's time for Congress to get off its ass and do something," said U.S. Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut, where 26 young children and educators were killed in an attack on a school in 2012.
"This must stop. It is positively infuriating that my colleagues in Congress are so afraid of the gun industry that they pretend there aren't public policy responses to this epidemic."
The rampage was reminiscent of a mass shooting at a Paris rock concert in November 2015 that killed 89 people, part of a wave of coordinated attacks by Islamist militants in which 130 people were killed.
source: news.abs-cbn.com
At least two people were killed and 24 were hospitalized after a shooting at a country music festival on the Las Vegas Strip, a local hospital spokeswoman said, and police said one suspect was down.
Witnesses on social media said the shooting broke out on the last night of the three-day Route 91 Harvest festival, a sold-out event attended by thousands and featuring top acts such as Eric Church, Sam Hunt and Jason Aldean.
U.S. media, including Fox News, reported that Aldean was performing on Sunday night when the rampage began but that he had been bundled safely off stage at the event outside the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino in the Nevada gambling mecca.
The spokeswoman for the University Medical Center hospital said 14 of the wounded were in a critical condition. All appeared to have suffered gunshot wounds, she said.
"Confirming that one suspect is down. This is an active investigation. Again, please do not head down to the Strip at this time, Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department said on Twitter.
It was not immediately clear whether the suspect was killed or injured. Police said on Twitter that at this time they did not believe there are any more shooters.
Las Vegas is an internationally renowned major resort city, known primarily for its gambling, shopping and entertainment.
Video on the festival's website showed stage set up outside the front of the Mandalay Bay.
The hotel is near McCarran International Airport, which said on Twitter it had temporarily halted flights after the shooting. Later, the airport said that some flights had resumed.
One Twitter user posted that the casino hotel was on lockdown, while another, citing police scanners, said two gunmen who had shot at a bodyguard and police were on the 32nd floor, although there was no confirmation from police.
Video clips posted online showed what sounded like automatic weapons as panicked concertgoers fled or dropped to the ground screaming.
Witnesses heard numerous gunshots at the hotel, where police tactical teams were searching for the attacker, according to reports on CNN and in the New York Times.
(Editing by Chris Michaud and Frank McGurty in New York; writing by Alison Williams; Editing by John Stonestreet and Frank McGurty)
source: news.abs-cbn.com
