Nashville Covenant School shooting: Three children and suspect dead

Nashville, Tennessee (BBC): Three children have been killed in a shooting in Nashville, Tennessee, according to local authorities.

On Twitter, the city’s fire department said there were “multiple patients” from an incident at a local school. It said the area remains “an active scene”.

Nashville police said they had engaged the shooter and the person is now dead.

Parents have been asked to meet at a nearby location.

Local media outlets and ABC report that three children were taken to hospital with gunshot wounds and were pronounced dead, citing sources at the local Vanderbilt University Medical Center.

An image shared to social media by Peyton Kennedy, a reporter for Nashville’s WKRN News 2, purportedly shows students being escorted away from the school.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) has said it is participating in the investigation.

The Covenant School in Nashville, where the incident took place, is a private Christian school for students in pre-school through the sixth grade, when students are roughly 11 or 12 years old.

According to its website, the school has approximately 200 students. Local media reported that it implemented an “active shooter” programme in 2022.

In a statement, Tennessee’s House Democratic Caucus said that its members are “praying for the children and their families who were shooting victims at the Covenant School”.

“Our thoughts are with the families of the entire school community and surrounding neighbourhood,” Chairman John Ray Clemmons said.

Freddie O’Connell, a Nashville mayoral candidate, said that Nashville has now “joined the communities that have experienced a school shooting”.

According to data compiled by Education Week, there were 12 school shootings in 2023 through 23 March that have resulted in deaths or injuries in the US.