'I have the will to live': N.B. woman needs double lung transplant
A New Brunswick woman suffering from sarcoidosis, a disease that limits your lung capacity, is in need of a double lung transplant.
Authorities released 911 recordings on Thursday that capture the terror inside a Nashville elementary school during a mass shooting this week, as callers pleaded for help in hushed voices while sirens, crying and gunfire could be heard in the background.
Police released recordings of three emergency calls made during Monday's attack at The Covenant School, in which three children and three adults were killed.
In one, 76-year-old retired church member Tom Pulliam tells the dispatcher he is with a group of people, including several children, who are walking away from the Christian school toward a main road. Although Pulliam remains calm, the tension and confusion of the situation are clear, with several adults speaking over each other and children's voices in the background.
When the dispatcher requests a description of the shooter, Pulliam asks a second man to get on the line.
"All I saw was a man holding an assault rifle shooting through the door. It was -- he's currently in the second grade hallway, upstairs" the man says, noting that the assailant was dressed in camouflage and wearing a vest.
Asked about how many shots were fired, a woman responds, "I heard about 10 and I left the building."
Pulliam, who was driving with his wife near the church when the attack happened, told The Associated Press on Thursday that he is struggling to make sense of it. He said he mostly recalls the children and how calm they seemed, not "yelling and screaming or anything."
"Up there for a normal day of school, these young children," he said. "Now, there's difficult days to go through."
In another call that started just before 10:13 a.m., a woman tells a dispatcher that she can hear a pause in the gunshots from her hiding spot in an art room closet.
Asked if it is a safe spot, the woman answers, "I think so," as children can be heard in the background.
The teacher then says she can hear more gunshots, begging the dispatcher, "Please hurry."
Another caller says he is in a second-floor room and asks the dispatcher to send help.
"I think we have a shooter at our church," he says, later adding that he thinks the shooter is on the second floor, too.
Authorities say the attack ended when police shot and killed the assailant, a former student they identified as 28-year-old Audrey Hale.
The release of the recordings came as people protested at the Tennessee Capitol on Thursday in favour of tighter gun controls, haranguing the Republican-led Legislature to take action.
Chants of "Save our children!" echoed noisily in the hallways between the state Senate and House chambers, with protesters setting up shop inside and outside the building. Some silently filled the Senate chamber's gallery, including children who held signs reading "I'm nine" -- a reference to the age of the kids who died. Most protesters were removed from the gallery after some began yelling down at the lawmakers, "Children are dead!"
The protests followed a Wednesday night candlelight vigil in Nashville where Republican lawmakers stood alongside first lady Jill Biden, Democratic lawmakers and musicians including Sheryl Crow, who has called for stricter gun controls since the attack.
The vigil was sombre and at times tearful, as speaker after speaker read the victims' names and offered condolences to their loved ones but refrained from any statement that could be seen as political.
"Just two days ago was our city's worst day," Mayor John Cooper said. "I so wish we weren't here, but we need to be here."
Police said Hale drove up to the school on Monday morning, shot out the glass doors, entered and began firing indiscriminately.
The three students who were killed were Evelyn Dieckhaus, Hallie Scruggs and William Kinney. The three adults were Katherine Koonce, 60, the head of the school, substitute teacher Cynthia Peak, 61, and Mike Hill, a 61-year-old custodian.
Funeral plans are starting to take shape, with services for Evelyn on Friday, Hallie on Saturday and Hill on Tuesday. Evelyn's obituary urged mourners to wear joyful colors as a tribute to her "light and love of color."
Absent from the vigil was Tennessee's Republican governor, Bill Lee, who has avoided public appearances this week and has not proposed any possible steps his administration might take in response to the shooting. Lee has been an advocate for less restrictive gun laws along with greater school security, and he once intimated that prayer could protect the state from school shootings and other things.
As with similar responses to gun violence, the state's Republican leaders have avoided calling for tighter gun restrictions and instead have thrown their support behind bolstering school security.
In a letter to Lee, Republican Lt. Gov. Randy McNally called for securing windows and glass in school buildings, adding magnetic locks on doors, modernizing camera systems, and increasing armed guards.
"While these changes would come with a cost, I believe it is important for us to have a conversation about how to increase and modernize security at schools in Tennessee," wrote McNally, adding later that he also is in favor of red flag laws like one in Florida.
Meanwhile, Tennessee's U.S. senators, Republicans Marsha Blackburn and Bill Hagerty, were pushing for legislation that would create a US$900 million grant program to "harden" schools and hire safety officers.
Metropolitan Nashville Police Chief John Drake has not said what investigators think the shooter's motive was, only noting that the assailant didn't target specific victims and had "some resentment for having to go to that school."
Drake said the shooter had drawn a detailed map of the school, including potential entry points, and conducted surveillance before carrying out the attack. Drake also said Hale left behind writings that the chief referred to as a "manifesto," but authorities haven't released the writings to the public.
Police have said Hale was under a doctor's care for an undisclosed "emotional disorder." However, authorities haven't disclosed a link between that care and the shooting. Police also said Hale was not on their radar before the attack.
Social media accounts and other sources indicate that the shooter identified as a man and might have recently begun using the first name Aiden. Police have said Hale "was assigned female at birth" but used masculine pronouns on a social media profile, however police have continued to use female pronouns and the name Audrey to describe Hale.
------
Associated Press reporter Adrian Sainz in Memphis contributed to this report.
A New Brunswick woman suffering from sarcoidosis, a disease that limits your lung capacity, is in need of a double lung transplant.
Pius Suter scored with 1:39 left and the Vancouver Canucks advanced to the second round of the NHL playoffs with a 1-0 victory over the Nashville Predators on Friday night in Game 6.
A Chinese truck driver was praised in local media Saturday for parking his vehicle across a highway and preventing more cars from tumbling down a slope after a section of the road in the country's mountainous south collapsed and killed at least 48 people.
York Regional Police say they are continuing to search for a suspect in an auto theft investigation who was captured on video running over a police officer in Toronto last month.
The adorable trio of child actors from the 1993 classic comedy 'Mrs. Doubtfire,' which starred the late and great Robin Williams, are all grown up and looking back on their seminal time together.
Video of a suspect lighting a Richmond Hill barbershop on fire earlier this week has been released by police.
Crucial witnesses took the stand in the second week of testimony in Donald Trump's hush money trial, including a California lawyer who negotiated deals at the center of the case and a longtime adviser to the former president.
A source close to singer Britney Spears tells CNN that the pop star is 'home and safe' after she had a 'major fight' with her boyfriend on Wednesday night at the Chateau Marmont in West Hollywood.
A Quebec man who pleaded guilty to threatening Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Premier François Legault has been sentenced to 20 months in jail.
Alberta Ballet's double-bill production of 'Der Wolf' and 'The Rite of Spring' marks not only its final show of the season, but the last production for twin sisters Alexandra and Jennifer Gibson.
A British Columbia mayor has been censured by city council – stripping him of his travel and lobbying budgets and removing him from city committees – for allegedly distributing a book that questions the history of Indigenous residential schools in Canada.
Three men in Quebec from the same family have fathered more than 600 children.
A group of SaskPower workers recently received special recognition at the legislature – for their efforts in repairing one of Saskatchewan's largest power plants after it was knocked offline for months following a serious flood last summer.
A police officer on Montreal's South Shore anonymously donated a kidney that wound up drastically changing the life of a schoolteacher living on dialysis.
Since 1932, Montreal's Henri Henri has been filled to the brim with every possible kind of hat, from newsboy caps to feathered fedoras.
Police in Oak Bay, B.C., had to close a stretch of road Sunday to help an elephant seal named Emerson get safely back into the water.
Out of more than 9,000 entries from over 2,000 breweries in 50 countries, a handful of B.C. brews landed on the podium at the World Beer Cup this week.
Raneem, 10, lives with a neurological condition and liver disease and needs Cholbam, a medication, for a longer and healthier life.