Shootings reported at college in Texas

One person was in critical condition and two others were taken to hospital with injuries after a shooting broke out between two people on the campus of Lone Star College near Houston on Tuesday, an official with an ambulance dispatch company said.

“We did transport three patients from the scene,” said Mark Smith, an official with Harris County Emergency Corps which dispatches ambulances in that area.

“The patients were described as one critical, two as urgent. My understanding is that at least one of the patients had heart issues, not gunshots,” he said.

Lockdown

Several students were seen running from the scene with their hands on their heads, and local schools were said to be in lockdown.

Some students tweeted from inside the school saying that they had heard “five or six shots” and were hiding under their desks

News reports said that one person had been detained in police custody, while another ran from the scene. School spokesman Jed Young said it was not clear if they were students.

Emergency crews have been focused in the area of the campus near the library, while the rest of the campus is being evacuated.

Alert issued

Lone Star College System issued an alert on its website telling students and faculty to take immediate shelter or avoid the campus.

Speaking to American network ABC 13, a Lone Star student, Keenan, has said he saw panic but received no official warning of the shooting and only had warning from other students.

He said: “I saw a lot of panic, a lot of ruckus. Everybody was panicked, everybody was crying. A student ran in and yelled in the bookstore ‘someone with a gun’ and the owner of the store locked the doors and told everyone to get back from the doors.”

The incident is likely to add fuel to the debate around the legalisation of guns in America which was reignited following the Sandy Hook massacre at the end of last year.

More shootings this year

There have been three separate shootings at schools and colleges in the United States in the past two weeks.

On January 10, a student armed with a shotgun opened fire at a California high school, wounding a fellow student. A second student also received minor injures at Taft Union High School in Taft, California, about 30 miles southwest of Bakersfield.

On January 15, a student armed with a pistol opened fire at Stevens Institute of business & Arts in downtown St. Louis, shooting a school employee and then turning the gun on himself.

Also on January 15, two people were killed and a third wounded when gunfire broke out in the parking lot of a community college in eastern Kentucky. Authorities said that shooting was a result of a domestic conflict.