Twelve people have been killed and at least 31 injured after a soldier went on a shooting rampage at the Fort Hood military base in Texas. Base commander Lieutenant-General Bob Cone says the gunman was killed during the incident at the facility, while two other soldiers were apprehended as suspects. The base is locked down.
One shooter is dead and two suspects have been apprehended President Obama calls shooting a "horrific outburst of violence" Shooting took place before graduation ceremony US media reports have named the dead gunman as Army Major Malik Nadal Hassan. It is understood the soldier, believed to be about 40 years old, was about to be deployed to Iraq.
President Barack Obama, speaking during an event at the Department of the Interior in Washington, described the incident as a "horrific outburst of violence". "It's difficult enough when we lose these brave Americans in battles overseas.
It is horrifying that they should come under fire at an army base on American soil," he said. Mr Obama offered his "thoughts and prayers" to the families of the victims. "We are working with the Pentagon, FBI, Department of Homeland Security to ensure that Fort Hood is secure," he said. "I would ask all Americans to keep the men and women of Fort Hood in our prayers." The US Senate held a moment of silence in sombre acknowledgement of the shooting rampage.
Motive unclear Lieutenant General Cone said the shooting took place about 1.30pm local time at a Soldier Readiness Facility, where troops preparing for overseas deployment were getting last-minute medical checkups. "The shooter was killed. He was a soldier," he said. "We since then have apprehended two additional soldiers who are suspects. "They tracked the suspected individuals to an adjacent facility and they were apprehended. They are soldiers, but they are suspects at this time, and we are looking at that.
"There were eyewitness accounts that there may have been more than one shooter." Christopher Hogue, chief of media at Fort Hood, told reporters: "The only one we know who was shooting was killed and he had two handguns." The shooter was included in the total of 12 killed. Pentagon officials said it was unclear what triggered the shooting. "I don't know how anybody can speculate about motives at this time given how few facts we have," Pentagon Press Secretary Geoff Morrell said.
A US Army official in Washington said the incident took place shortly before a scheduled graduation event at the base. Foot Hood is the biggest military base in the world and a prime point of deployment for US operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
It is home to about 50,000 troops, although Texas US Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison said there were about 35,000 troops at the base at the time. Fort Hood is halfway between Austin and Waco, about 100 kilometres from each city. The US Army is suffering a record high suicide rate and there has been plenty of other signs of stress from fighting two wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Source - abc.net
