There are already 11 victims after the attack on Saturday night at a dance venue in California. Horror and panic stories.
Grace was in the back corner of the ballroom, practicing her steps, joining about 100 other patrons who knew the Star Ballroom Dance Studio as the place to be on Saturday nights. Many were facing the wall-sized mirror, performing their own dance moves. No one expected the shooting that ended with at least 11 deaths in Los Angeles, California, this Saturday night.
The music of “guangchang wu,” a public square dance popular with middle-aged and older Chinese patrons, recalled Grace, a dance student in her 50s who had attended the Star Ballroom for about four years.
Then all of a sudden heard a series of explosions They sounded like fireworks. He looked towards the entrance and saw people collapsing on the ground. She promptly dove herself under a table while others frantically did the same.
He could see the shooter and his long semi-automatic weapon with which, it later emerged, he murdered ten people. This Monday, another person who had been injured also died.
“No one dared to run away, we all fell to the ground, hiding where we could,” he said in an interview on Sunday afternoon. She asked to be identified only by her name in English because she did not want people in the community to know that she was there at the time of the shooting.
“No one could get out” commented. A man she called “Ma laoban”–“Boss Ma”–was near the entrance and appeared to be the first to be shot, Grace said. Two people next to him also collapsed as five or six gunshots occurred in quick succession.
The gunman appeared to run out of bullets and quickly left before returning to unleash a second burst of gunfire further into the ballroom. Some people who looked like they had been shot were sprawled out on the wooden floor. Others ducked under a table or ran into a back room. The entire mass shooting lasted about five minutes.Grace noted.
“I saw it, but it was a long way away and the lights were dim. I couldn’t see her face clearly, ”said the woman, referring to the attacker. She also said that she had not recognized the suspect in photos released by local authorities on Sunday morning while he was on the run.
The suspect later committed suicide on Sunday, hours after the shooting, in a Torrance parking lot surrounded by police, Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna said. The attacker was identified as Huu Can Tran, 72 years old.
second attack
After the shooter left, several people called 911, and police appeared to arrive quickly. They were taken to the police station for hours of detailed questioning about the suspect, Grace said.
As it turned out, after killing ten people, Tran headed next to another ballroom dance studio in Alhambra, about three miles away, where two customers snatched his gun and the suspect fled on foot, Sheriff Luna said.
Grace said she didn’t get home until 3 a.m. Sunday and only slept for about an hour because her phone was ringing off the hook with calls from friends and acquaintances who knew Star hung out.
She clutched her heart, describing how scared and shocked she still felt a day after the shooting. She wasn’t sure she could go back to the studio, where she said dancing had kept her happy and healthy.
“It brings me joy. My instructor is very positive and brings me joy too,” she commented sadly. “Once the suspect is arrested, maybe after a healing period, he might come back.”
Fuente: The New York Times
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