I don’t see the need for posting the actual 911 calls from terrified teachers and workers at Sandy Hook the day Adam Lanza decided to slaughter 26 people. I see no point in hearing people scream for their lives, or hearing gunshots ringing in the background as kids were murdered. I side with the families of the slain that these tapes should not be released. But today, they were. And based on other reports, the tapes are indeed gruesome and disturbing.
Gunshots boomed in the background as panicked callers flooded Newtown’s 911 emergency line with desperate pleas for help as deranged gunman Adam Lanza blasted his way into Sandy Hook Elementary School and massacred 26 students and staffers, recordings released Wednesday reveal.
“Sandy Hook School, I think there’s someone shooting in here, Sandy Hook School!” a terrified woman reported in one of the earliest of seven calls released by police.
“I caught a glimpse of somebody. They’re running down the hallway. Oh, they’re still running and still shooting. Sandy Hook school, please,” the woman pleaded, her voice trembling.
Another call came from a custodian, Rick Thorne, who said that a window at the front of the school was shattered and that he kept hearing shooting.
Thorne remained on the phone for several minutes.
“There’s still shooting going on, please!” the custodian pleaded to the 911 dispatcher, as six or seven shots could be heard booming in the background. “I keep hearing shooting, I keep hearing popping! … Still, it’s still going on!”
While on the line with Thorne, the dispatcher told somebody off the call: “Get everyone you can going down there.”
The recordings show dispatchers calmly responding to the panicked janitor, a teacher and others while assuring them help was on the way as gunman Adam Lanza blasted his way through the school.
The operators urge the callers – who reported hearing multiple gunshots – to take cover as they desperately contact town and state police for help.
The operators also ask about the welfare of the children.
Lanza, 20, stormed the school on the morning of Dec. 14 and gunned down 20 children and six educators with a semi-automatic rifle. He had earlier killed his mother nancy as she slept, and blew his own brains out as police arrived.
The calls begin at 9:35 a.m. from the school’s central office, saying the front glass had been shot out.
There were a total of seven landline calls from inside the school to Newtown police — including Thorne’s.
The janitor stayed on the phone with a dispatcher as he made his way through the school trying to warn staffers and students about Lanza’s bloody rampage.
Another call came from a teacher.
“It sounds like there are gunshots in the hallway. I’m a teacher at the school,” the woman said. “All of my students are in the classroom …the door’s not locked yet.”
The dispatcher tells her to lock the door and keep the children away from the windows.
