Two students were wounded in a school shooting in North Californiapolice said Wednesday afternoon and the suspected shooter is dead. The injured students are five and six years old, according to KCRA, an NBC Sacramento affiliate station. The students are being treated for injuries, Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea told reporters on Wednesday.
The shooting took place at the Feather River Adventist School in Oroville, a city of 20,000 people, far north of the city. Hon said the media that about eleven o’clock he began his duty from the school to receive every one on the campus to fire the shots of the students. Deputies responded immediately, Honea said, and found a man dead at the scene after what appeared to be a gunshot wound.
Two injured students were taken to hospital, one was transported by helicopter. The sheriff said officials had made a “potential identification” of the shooter, and that it did not immediately appear that he was connected to the school, which has been open since 1965 and serves about 35 students.
Authorities are still early in their investigation, Honea said, and much is still unknown. The office plans to consult with the FBI.
The shooter approached the campus to discuss a student’s writing at the school, according to KCRA reporter Lysée Mitri. Gunfire and shouts rang out after the meeting. Investigators hint at the possibility of the shooter coming onto the campus during the service and that the school may have been targeted because of its affiliation with the Seventh-day Adventist Church.
Buses arrived at the school on Wednesday afternoon to transport students and reunite them with their parents. Chaplains and crisis counselors would be available to help those affected, Honea said.
Oroville was a place of high-profile shootings in 2022, when a man opened fire on a Greyhound bus bound for Los Angeles, killing one person, a 43-year-old traveling with his two sons, and injuring four others, including a pregnant woman.
The region found itself in the nationals bow Over the years, there have been many devastating and often destructive fires, including the 2018 Camp Fire that killed 85 people, which Honea hinted at in his press conference outside the Feather River School.
“This is another tragedy that has visited our city” he said. “I hope people can realize how difficult this is for the students of this school, the faculty of this school, the members of this community, all the first responders.”