In the wake of the deadly shooting at Orlando’s Pulse nightclub on Sunday, survivors are speaking out online to offer messages of love and hope.
At least 49 people were killed during the attack at the popular LGBT club, and dozens remain in hospital in serious condition.
In its latest update released Thursday, the Orlando Regional Medical Centre said its surgeons had performed 52 operations. Of the 23 survivors still in hospital, at least six remained in critical condition, and 21 others have been discharged.
As their wounds heal and the difficult recovery process begins, some survivors have turned to social media to share their stories.
ANGEL COLON
Angel Colon was shot three times and broke his left leg as frantic club-goers fled Pulse. He was rushed to hospital with several bullet wounds. On Thursday, Colon was reunited with a police officer who pulled him to safety.
Eatonville Police Officer Omar Delgado walked into Colon’s hospital room and introduced himself to the young man.
“I’m one of the ones that helped you get out of harm’s way,” Delgado says in a video of the meeting.
In response, Colon opened his arms for a hug.
“So glad you’re alive, man,” the officer says as he embraces Colon.
Colon described his recovery to the officer, showing him where the bullets struck his right leg and describing the titanium rod implanted in his left leg.
“I’m getting there, little by little,” he said.
Angel’s friends have posted online about the young man’s recovery.
JEANNETTE MCCOY
For Jeannette McCoy, heading to Pulse was a last-minute decision. In a Facebook post, she wrote that the choice has forever changed the course of her life.
McCoy, 37, was with Angel Colon when the shots rang out. She ran with Colon for safety, and she was in front of him when the bullets hit him in the back.
“If he wasn't behind me that bullet would have been in my back,” she wrote online. “I love you. I am forever grateful for you.”
NORMAN CASIANO
When the shots began, Norman Casiano fled to a bathroom near the back of Pulse nightclub and huddled with others inside a bathroom stall. The gunman entered the bathroom shortly after.
Casiano, 25, told the New York Times that the gunman began by shooting the bathroom stall door and then reached the assault rifle overtop the stall and fired randomly at the group below.
In an emotional Facebook video posted from his hospital bed the morning after the shooting, Casiano described his injuries.
“I’m fine,” he says. “I was shot four times in my back. Thankfully they just went straight through.”
He thanked family and friends for their outpouring of love and said the next step is emotional healing. “Other than my injuries I’m hanging on, trying to control the emotions of all the things I saw and have gone through since yesterday,” he said.
“The best thing we can do is stay happy, remember these people for the good they did in life, and keep praying for those of us that are in the hospital.”
PATIENCE CARTER
Patience Carter, 20, also hid inside a bathroom stall during the shooting. Speaking at a news conference outside Florida Orlando Hospital, Carter described how the gunman spoke to the hostages.
“He asked if there are any black people in here; I was too afraid to answer,” said Carter, who is African-American. “But there was an African-American man in the stall where most of my body was, and he said, ‘Yes, there are about six or seven of us.’ And the gunman responded by saying, ‘You know, I don’t have a problem with black people. This is about my country. You guys have suffered enough.’”
Carter has since posted about her recovery on Facebook, detailing her state of mind in a post titled “Truth.”
“As long as the majority of the world that sends their love and support knows the truth. As long as the strong members of the LGBT community know the truth. As long as I know the truth ... I can find some peace to heal. I can find some peace to learn how to walk again. I can find some peace to want to live on,” she wrote.
JEFF RODRIGUEZ
Jeff Rodriguez was posting photos from his night at Pulse just half an hour before the shooting began. Rodriguez’s family shared his story on a GoFundMe page.
Rodriguez texted his brother amid the shooting to say he was shot and that he was surrounded by bodies.
Rodriguez was among the final survivors taken from the club, his family said. He was shot three times: once above his heart, once in his abdomen and once in his leg.
Rodriguez’s brother wrote on a GoFundMe update that doctors think he could be paralyzed in the right leg, but that Rodriguez doesn’t know it yet.
He has undergone several rounds of surgery, and the family plans to use the money they raise to pay for treatment. By Thursday, nearly US$13,000 of the family’s US$15,000 goal had been raised.
