Female former student, 28, armed with two assault rifles and a handgun, kills five in Nashville school massacre

Three kids and three adults are gunned down at private Christian elementary before police took out shooter

The shooting took place on Monday at The Covenant School in Nashville 

Nashville Metropolitan Police officers neutralized the shooter – Two cops who entered the building, drawn by the direction of the gunfire, encountered the shooter on the second floor and fatally shot her

It’s unclear what her motive was, but police believe the Nashville resident attended the school at some point 

A heavily armed woman shot dead three students and three staff members at a small private Christian elementary school in Nashville, TN, early Monday.
Officers engaged and killed the shooter at the Covenant School, Nashville police spokesperson Don Aaron said. The shooter was a 28-year-old Nashville woman, police said.
It’s unclear what her motive was, but police believe the Nashville resident was once a student at the school. 
Three children and two adults were taken to Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt with gunshot wounds, and all five were pronounced dead there, said Craig Boerner, spokesperson for Vanderbilt University Medical Center.
The sixth victim was not taken to the hospital, Aaron said.
The shooter was armed with at least two “assault-type rifles” and a handgun, Aaron said. Officials were in the process of identifying the shooter and the victims, he said.
Officials with the FBI and special agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were on the scene. The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation said special agents and additional personnel were responding but added there is “no current threat to public safety.”

The shooter entered through a side entrance of the school and went to the second floor “firing multiple shots,” Aaron said.
Police received call of an active shooter at 10:13 a.m., Aaron said. Officers responded “swiftly,” entered the first floor and began clearing the area, he said. They “immediately went to the gunfire,” he said.
Two of the five officers on the floor opened fire on the shooter and killed her by 10:27 a.m., he said. She was in a “lobby-type area,” not a classroom, Aaron said.
Kendra Loney, a spokesperson with Metro Fire, said rescue crews responded and tried to save lives.
The remaining students were escorted out of the building with faculty and staff, and buses took them to the site where students were being reunited with their parents, Loney said.
“We’re sure that they heard the chaos that was surrounding this,” she said.

The Covenant School is a private school founded in 2001 that serves students in pre-kindergarten through grade six, according to its website. On a given day, slightly over 200 students and 42 staff members are at the school, Aaron said.
The school is on the campus of Covenant Presbyterian Church in the city’s Green Hills neighborhood, about 9 miles southeast of downtown Nashville. It’s next door to a Nashville Fire Department station and less than a mile south of Nashville’s largest shopping district.
Because a church operates the private school, no Nashville police officers were assigned to the building, Aaron said. Officers were reviewing video from the school, Aaron said.

Adrienne Battle, director of Metro Nashville Public Schools, said she was “grieving today over the tragic murder of children and school staff right here in our community,” calling the killings an “unimaginable loss of life.”
“We don’t know all of the details of how or why this happened, and we may never fully know,” Battle said. “At Metro Schools, we have invested considerable resources to strengthen security at our facilities in response to the far too many, far too often instances of school shootings across the nation over the years.”

At the scene, scores of parents and onlookers gathered in a parking lot, awaiting updates, as helicopters circled the area, surrounded by a residential and busy businesses district.
Parents were lining up in the sanctuary of Woodmont Baptist Church to give first and last names of their children to police.
Vice Mayor Jim Shulman was in the sanctuary passing out bottled water to parents and family members.
Officials said children would be arriving on school buses with their teachers.

Two officers who entered the building went towards the sound of gunfire and encountered the shooter on the school’s second floor, where they fatally shot her.
Nashville Police Chief John Drake said initial findings indicate the attacker may have been a former student at the school. He said the findings are based on “clues” found inside a nearby parked car.

At the scene, scores of parents and onlookers gathered in a parking lot, awaiting updates, as helicopters circled the area, surrounded by a residential and busy businesses district.
Parents were lining up in the sanctuary of Woodmont Baptist Church to give first and last names of their children to police.
Vice Mayor Jim Shulman was in the sanctuary passing out bottled water to parents and family members.
Officials said children would be arriving on school buses with their teachers.