Families of those inside Robb Elementary School when a teenage gunman opened fire on Tuesday were asked to give DNA samples to help investigators identify victims.
Loved ones lined up outside an auditorium near Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, where 18-year-old gunman Salvador Ramos 21 people, including 19 children aged seven to 10, and two teachers.
Sobs from families waiting outside the auditorium could be heard throughout the evening as parents waited news of whether their children had been in the massacre.
Families went ‘one by one’ getting swabbed by investigators as the death toll increased into the night.
Others waited desperately at designated meeting spots for their loved ones to appear. Parents huddled in packs and by their cars well into the evening Tuesday, some still waiting on news of their children at 10pm, according to Austin American-Statesman reporter Niki Griswold, who tweeted live from the civic center.
Heartbreaking screams from families receiving tragic news about their loved ones filled the air, and could be heard well into the parking lot, according to Griswold’s twitter thread.
DNA swabs are often used to verify the identities of disaster victims in cases where bodies are not immediately identifiable.
The elementary school directed all parents to the reunification site, and shared in notice that students needed to be accounted for before being released to their parents.
At least 19 students and two teachers died after the teenage shooter opened fire at Robb Elementary School. All the victims were located in one fourth-grade classroom, according to state officials. The suspected shooter, an 18-year-old male, has also died.
Tuesday’s shooting was the deadliest school shooting since the 2012 Sandy Hook massacre, which resulted in the deaths of 27 people in Newtown, Connecticut. The death toll also surpassed the 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida in 2018.
.
