THIS HAS NOT BEEN VERIFIED BUT HAS BEEN SUBMITTED BY A RELIABLE SOURCE AT FT HOOD
By Gordon Duff STAFF WRITER/Senior Editor EDITORS NOTE: IF THIS IS ACCURATE, IT NEEDS TO BE OUT THERE. HOWEVER, BEWARE, THIS HAS NOT BEEN VERIFIED AND IS A GRAPHIC AND BRUTAL READ.
E-mail from F. Hood.
> Subject: What happened
> Since I don’t know when I’ll sleep (it’s 4 am now) I’ll write
> what happened (the abbreviated version…..the long one is already part
> of the investigation with more to come). I’ll not write about any part
> of the investigation that I’ve learned about since (as a witness I know
> more than I should since inevitably my JAG brothers and sisters are
> deeply involved in the investigation). Don’t assume that most of the
> current media accounts are very accurate. They’re not. They’ll improve
> with time. Only those of us who were there really know what went down.
> But as they collate our statements they’ll get it right.
> I did my SRP last week (Soldier Readiness Processing) but you’re
> supposed to come back a week later to have them look at the smallpox
> vaccination site (it’s this big itchy growth on your shoulder). I am
> probably alive because I pulled a ———- and entered the wrong
> building first (the main SRP building).The Medical SRP building is off
> to the side. Realizing my mistake I left the main building and walked
> down the sidewalk to the medical SRP building. As I’m walking up to it
> the gunshots start. Slow and methodical. But continuous. Two
> ambulatory wounded came out. Then two soldiers dragging a third who was
> covered in blood. Hearing the shots but not seeing the shooter, along
> with a couple other soldiers I stood in the street and yelled at
> everyone who came running that it was clear but to "RUN!".I kept
> motioning people fast. about 6-10 minutes later (the shooting
> continuous), two cops ran up. one male, one female. we pointed
> > in the direction of the shots. they headed that way (the
> medical SRP building was about 50 meters away). then a lot more
> gunfire. a couple minutes later a balding man in ACU’s came around the
> building carrying a pistol and holding it tactically. He started
> shooting at us and we all dived back to the cars behind us. I don’t
> think he hit the couple other guys who were there. I did see the bullet
> holes later in the cars. First I went behind a tire and then looked
> under the body of the car. I’ve been trained how to respond to
> gunfire…but with my own weapon.To have no weapon I don’t know how to
> explain what that felt like. I hadn’t run away and stayed because I had
> thought about the consequences or anything like that. I wasn’t thinking
> anything through. Please understand, there was no intention. I was
> just staying there because I didn’t think about running. It never
> occurred to me that he might shoot me. Until he started
> > shooting in my direction and I realized I was unarmed. Then the
> female cop comes around the corner. He shoots her. (according to the
> news accounts she got a round into him.I believe it, I just didn’t see
> it. he didn’t go down.) She goes down. He starts reloading. He’s
> fiddling with his mags. Weirdly he hasn’t dropped the one that was in
> his weapon. He’s holding the fresh one and the old one (you do that on
> the range when time is not of the essence but in combat you would just
> let the old mag go). I see the male cop around the left corner of the
> building. (I’m about 15-20 meters from the shooter.)I yell at the
> cop, "He’s reloading, he’s reloading. Shoot him! Shoot him!) You have
> to understand, everything was quiet at this point. The cop appears to
> hear me and comes around the corner and shoots the shooter. He goes
> down. The cop kicks his weapon further away. I sprint up to the downed
> female cop. Another captain (I
> > think he was with me behind the cars) comes up as well. She’s
> bleeding profusely out of her thigh. We take our belts off and
> tourniquet her just like we’ve been trained (I hope we did it right…we
> didn’t have any CLS (combat lifesaver) bags with their awesome
> tourniquets on us, so we worked with what we had). Meanwhile, in the
> most bizarre moment of the day, a photographer was standing over us
> taking pictures. I suppose I’ll be seeing those tomorrow. Then a
> soldier came up and identified himself as a medic.I then realized her
> weapon was lying there unsecured (and on "fire"). I stood over it and
> when I saw a cop yelled for him to come over and secure her weapon (I
> would have done so but I was worried someone would mistake me for a bad
> guy). I then went over to the shooter. He was unconscious. A Lt
> Colonel was there and had secured his primary weapon for the time being.
> He also had a revolver.I couldn’t believe he was
> > one of ours. I didn’t want to believe it. Then I saw his name
> and rank and realized this wasn’t just some specialist with mental
> issues. At this point there was a guy there from CID and I asked him if
> he knew he was the shooter and had him secured. He said he did. I then
> went over the slaughter house. the medical SRP building. No human
> should ever have to see what that looked like. and I won’t tell you.
> Just believe me. Please. there was nothing to be done there. Someone
> then said there was someone critically wounded around the corner.I ran
> around (while seeing this floor to ceiling window that someone had
> jumped through movie style) and saw a large African-American soldier
> lying on his back with two or three soldiers attending. I ran up and
> identified two entrance wounds on the right side of his stomach, one
> exit wound on the left side and one head wound. He was not bleeding
> externally from the stomach wounds (though
> > almost certainly internally) but was bleeding from the head
> wound. A soldier was using a shirt to try and stop the head bleeding.
> He was conscious so I began talking to him to keep him so. He was 42,
> from North Carolina, he was named something Jr., his son was named
> something III and he had a daughter as well. His children lived with
> him. He was divorced.I told him the blubber on his stomach saved his
> life. He smiled. a young soldier in civvies showed up and identified
> himself as a combat medic. We debated whether to put him on the back of
> a pickup truck. A doctor (well, an audiologist) showed up and said you
> can’t move him, he has a head wound. we finally sat tight. I went back
> to the slaughterhouse. they weren’t letting anyone in there. not even
> medics. finally, after about 45 minutes had elapsed some cops showed up
> in tactical vests. someone said the TBI building was unsecured. They
> headed into there.All of a
> > sudden a couple more shots were fired. People shouted there was
> a second shooter. a half hour later the SWAT showed up. there was no
> second shooter. that had been an impetuous cop apparently. but that
> confused things for a while. meanwhile I went back to the shooter. the
> female cop had been taken away. a medic was pumping plasma into the
> shooter. I’m not proud of this but I went up to her and said "this is
> the shooter, is there anyone else who needs attention…do them first".
> she indicated everyone else living was attended to. I still hadn’t seen
> any EMTs or ambulances. I had so much blood on me that people kept
> asking me if I was ok. but that was all other people’s blood.
> eventually (an hour and a half to two hours after the shootings) they
> started landing choppers. they took out the big African American guy
> and the shooter. I guess the ambulatory wounded were all at the SRP
> building. Everyone else in my area
> > was dead.
> >
> >I suppose the emergency responders were told there were multiple
> shooters. I heard that was the delay with the choppers (they were all
> civilian helicopters). they needed a secure LZ. but other than the
> initial cops who did everything right, I didnt’ see a lot of them for a
> while. I did see many a soldier rush out to help their fellows/sisters.
> there was one female soldier, I dont’ know her name or rank but I would
> recognize her anywhere who was everywhere helping people. a couple
> people, mainly civilians, were hysterical, but only a couple. one
> civilian freaked out when I tried to comfort her when she saw my
> uniform. I guess she had seen the shooter up close. a lot of soldiers
> were rushing out to help even when we thought there was another gunman
> out there. this Army is not broken no matter what the pundits say. not
> the Army I saw.
> >
> > and then they kept me for a long time to come. oh, and perhaps
> the most surreal thing, at 1500 (the end of the workday on Thursdays)
> when the bugle sounded we all came to attention and saluted the flag.
> in the middle of it all.
>
> this is what I saw. it can’t have been real. but this is my
> small corner of what happened.
>
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