When two volunteer firefighters rolled up to an elementary school shooting, they said they found only a wrecked black pickup truck at the playground. There was no gunman, and no one inside the truck.
Within minutes, though, they performed actions that led to them being hailed as heroes throughout their tight-knit South Carolina hometown: One went inside to help treat the wounded and the other searched for the shooter.
“This was more than just another call to us. This incident occurred in the school where our children and the children of the community attend,” Townville fire Chief Billy McAdams said Thursday during a news conference, pausing to collect himself as he recalled the harrowing events of the day before.
Authorities say the teen shot his father at their home before driving the pickup 3 miles down a country road lined with chicken houses and pine trees to Townville Elementary School. He only had to make two turns to arrive at the red brick school, where he crashed the truck, got out and fired at a door as it was being opened for recess, authorities said.
Bullets struck two students and a first-grade teacher, and the building was immediately placed on lock down.
One of the wounded, 6-year-old Jacob Hall, remained in critical condition Thursday and was said to be fighting for his life. A sign outside a diner conveyed the sentiments of an entire community: “Pray for Jacob. Pray for Townville.”
The teacher who was shot in the shoulder and another student who was hit in the foot were treated and released from a hospital, officials said.
The shooter never made it inside the school, and no one else was hurt, Anderson County District 4 Superintendent Joanne Avery said.
“I am tremendously proud of our injured teacher who put her own life at risk to rush her students to safety,” Avery wrote on the district’s website, saying the students and staff have been through active-shooter training over the past few years.
Classes are scheduled to resume at the school Monday, but second-grader Mattie LeCroy doesn’t want to go. Asked whether she was scared to return to school, the blond-haired 7-year-old simply nodded her head “yes” after dropping off flowers for Jacob with her mom at the town’s fire station.
The violence was a punch in the gut to people around Townville, where residents say some families have lived on the same land since before the Civil War. Outside a church where workers offered counseling and other aid to residents, both U.S. and Confederate flags decorate graves in the burial yard.