As Pat Young walked back from his biology lab at around 9:45 a.m. Monday, April 16, he wondered where everybody was. On a campus with more than 25,000 students, there wasn't another soul to be found.
“I was walking back across the drill field, and there was no one ... at all,” said Young, an 18-year-old Skaneateles resident and a freshman at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Va.
Young figured that people had slept in or decided not to go to class for one reason or another. It wasn't until he got back to his dorm at Pritchard Hall that he learned of all that had transpired, of the 30 people who had been massacred in Norris Hall, a building that Young had walked by on his way to and from class that morning.
Those killings have now been attributed to senior Virginia Tech student Cho Seung-Hui, who also took his own life in Norris Hall. Police have not yet been able to definitely say whether or not Seung-Hui is also responsible for two fatal shootings earlier that morning in West Ambler Johnston Hall, a dorm just 50 feet away from Pritchard.
It is the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history.
Piecing together information from e-mails sent by Virginia Tech officials and the breaking news on CNN and Fox News, Young and his friends watched the death tolls climb.
“I just sat there for like six hours just being like, oh my gosh,” recalled Young, a 2006 Skaneateles High School graduate who is majoring in pre-med.
When Young walked by Norris Hall, the scene of most of the carnage, after class, he didn't hear anything. He isn't sure if he walked by just before or after the shootings, but there were no police on scene yet, Young said.
Over the next few hours, Young and his peers were on lockdown. They spent their time glued to the TV and tried to contact friends and loved ones. Cell phones didn't always work because everyone was using theirs, but the landlines worked occasionally and students were able to communicate via the Internet.
“I have all of my friends accounted for,” Young said. A friend of a friend was shot in the leg but is OK, he added.
As soon as officials removed the lockdown, “I was like, all right, well, I'm going home,” Young said, noting that his mother and girlfriend wanted him back in Skaneateles.
Throughout last week, he remained in contact with his Virginia Tech friends.
“My friend called me from the congregation (on April 16). He was just like, ”I don't even know what to say now. I'm devastated right now.' “
Young said last week that he planned to return to Virginia Tech Sunday or Monday (UPDATE). He wasn't scared about going back to the place that he has called home for the past few months, noting that the odds of something like this happening again are slim.
Though Virginia Tech officials have taken some heat about not notifying students quickly enough regarding the first shooting in the dorm, Young doesn't blame his college in any way.
And he doesn't want to see these incidents discourage future students from applying to the school. “I just hope that people know that this isn't Virginia Tech,” Young said.
Despite its large size, Virginia Tech has always been a tight-knit community, he added.
“We're still all Hokies,” he said, “and that definitely brought up together even more.”
Young figured that people had slept in or decided not to go to class for one reason or another. It wasn't until he got back to his dorm at Pritchard Hall that he learned of all that had transpired, of the 30 people who had been massacred in Norris Hall, a building that Young had walked by on his way to and from class that morning.
Those killings have now been attributed to senior Virginia Tech student Cho Seung-Hui, who also took his own life in Norris Hall. Police have not yet been able to definitely say whether or not Seung-Hui is also responsible for two fatal shootings earlier that morning in West Ambler Johnston Hall, a dorm just 50 feet away from Pritchard.
It is the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history.
Piecing together information from e-mails sent by Virginia Tech officials and the breaking news on CNN and Fox News, Young and his friends watched the death tolls climb.
“I just sat there for like six hours just being like, oh my gosh,” recalled Young, a 2006 Skaneateles High School graduate who is majoring in pre-med.
When Young walked by Norris Hall, the scene of most of the carnage, after class, he didn't hear anything. He isn't sure if he walked by just before or after the shootings, but there were no police on scene yet, Young said.
Over the next few hours, Young and his peers were on lockdown. They spent their time glued to the TV and tried to contact friends and loved ones. Cell phones didn't always work because everyone was using theirs, but the landlines worked occasionally and students were able to communicate via the Internet.
“I have all of my friends accounted for,” Young said. A friend of a friend was shot in the leg but is OK, he added.
As soon as officials removed the lockdown, “I was like, all right, well, I'm going home,” Young said, noting that his mother and girlfriend wanted him back in Skaneateles.
Throughout last week, he remained in contact with his Virginia Tech friends.
“My friend called me from the congregation (on April 16). He was just like, ”I don't even know what to say now. I'm devastated right now.' “
Young said last week that he planned to return to Virginia Tech Sunday or Monday (UPDATE). He wasn't scared about going back to the place that he has called home for the past few months, noting that the odds of something like this happening again are slim.
Though Virginia Tech officials have taken some heat about not notifying students quickly enough regarding the first shooting in the dorm, Young doesn't blame his college in any way.
And he doesn't want to see these incidents discourage future students from applying to the school. “I just hope that people know that this isn't Virginia Tech,” Young said.
Despite its large size, Virginia Tech has always been a tight-knit community, he added.
“We're still all Hokies,” he said, “and that definitely brought up together even more.”
The Citizens' Say
There are No comments posted.