It was an ordinary day at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida on Wednesday, February 14th. Until it wasn’t. For that day would be one of the largest massacres in modern U.S. history. The shooter, 19-year-old Nikolas Cruz, was a former MSDHS student. According to CNN, “Cruz was fascinated with guns and violence.” Such an unfathomable fact to hear. That someone could be so infatuated with such horrific things. Cruz had also posted threats and photos of himself holding guns in social media. This should have been a dead give away for many people, but alas, the tragedy still occurred.
Students were confused and stunned when the fire alarm went off. When it was announced that it was not a drill, the reality of the situation hit the students hard. Many of them begin texting their loved ones as they went into hiding and the school went on lock-down. It all happened so quickly. “Pop-pop! Pop-pop!” Bodies crumpled to the ground. A physical education coach and security guard, Aaron Feis, used his own body to shield some of his students from the gunshots. He dies a hero. “That’s Coach Feis,” Colton Haab, a 17-year-old junior and football player, says. “He wants to make sure everybody is safe before himself.”
Lori Alhadeff, mother of Alyssa, raced to the school after learning of the shooting. “I knew at that point she was gone,” Alhadeff said. “I felt it in my heart.” Alyssa did not survive the shooting. Nearly 80 minutes, 80 WHOLE MINUTES after the first 911 call, the police captured the shooter and had him arrested. “He looked like a typical high school student,” officer Michael Leonard said. “For a quick moment I thought, ‘Could this be the person? Is this who I need to stop?'”
“The suspect in the deadliest school shooting since Sandy Hook was caught and 17 people were dead.”
It’s days like these that remind us how important love is and how we need to be prepared for horrific situations such as the Parkland Massacre. We must be strong. We cannot save the world, but we can restore the good in humanity. We just have to take caution. A good start would be maximizing gun control.
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