12 Killed in Fort Hood shooting!

12 Dead, 31 Wounded in Base Shootings

At least one gunman killed 11 soldiers and wounded 31 others on Thursday afternoon at Fort Hood in Texas. Authorities then killed the gunman, who was identified as Malik Nadal Hasan, an Army major who was about to be deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan.

Lt. Gen. Robert W. Cone, the commanding officer at Fort Hood, the largest active military installation in the country, said the base was placed in lockdown as military authorities, with the help of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, investigate the rampage.

“This was a terrible tragedy,” said General Cone, speaking at a news conference Thursday afternoon. “Stunning.”‘



Mr. Hasan was a medical officer, military officials said, and The Associated Press reported that his specialty was psychiatry.

The Austin-American Statesman quoted Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison’s spokesman, Jeff Sadoski, as saying Major Hasan was upset about his deployment.

President Obama, speaking from the White House, called it “a horrific outburst of violence.”

“My immediate thoughts and prayers are with the wounded and with the families of the fallen,” the president said.

“We don’t yet know all the details at this moment,” he said. “We will share them as we get them. What we do know is that a number of American soldiers have been killed and even more have been wounded in a horrific outburst of violence.”

“It is horrifying that they should come under fire at an Army base on American soil,” the president said.

General Cone said the shooting began at about 1:30 p.m. Central time, when a soldier entered the soldier readiness unit, where soldiers receive last-minute medical attention and other instruction before being being deployed overseas, including to Iraq and Afghanistan.

“A soldier opened fire, and due to the quick response of the police forces, he was killed,” General Cone said.

“There were several eyewitness accounts that there was more than one shooter,” he said. Two other soldiers were also taken into custody, he said, but the authorities are continuing to sort out what exactly happened.

General Cone said that the sprawling base has facilities that house children, but that there were no children among the dead or wounded.

“The soldiers and family members are absolutely devastated,” he said.

He said that the local police had responded quickly and that the wounded were taken to an area hospital.

Earlier, Senator Hutchison she had been apprised of the shootings.

“Our hearts go out,” she told Fox 4 News. “These are soldiers who are getting ready to go out to Iraq or Afghanistan and their families were under stress already. This was just a terrible tragedy and we don’t even know the extent of it yet.”

The based was the site today of the annual college graduation ceremonies for soldiers and family members who have not had the opportunity to participate in college commencement exercises during the past year because of deployment, according to the Fort Hood Sentinel.

In 1991 in Killeen, Tex., not far from the fort, one of the worst mass killings in United States history took place, when a crazed gunman drove his pickup truck through a cafeteria window, shot 22 people to death with a handgun, then killed himself.