On March 27, 2023, a shooter opened fire in The Covenant School, a private Christian school located just outside of Nashville, Tennessee according to the BBC. The shooter, who was identified as 28-year-old Audrey Hale, was a former Covenant student. Six people were killed in the incident, which included three nine-year-old students and three school staff members.

The first reports of gunshots came in at 10:13 am, when the shooter shot through two sets of glass doors to enter the building. According to NPR, surveillance released by the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department showed the shooter, dressed in camouflage pants with a black vest and red hat, wandering through the school as fire alarms went off. The shooter was armed with multiple assault-style weapons and a handgun. When the arriving officers showed up to the scene, they saw Hale firing down at them from a second story window. Police made their way into the building and fatally shot Hale at 10:27 am.

In the shooting, three nine-year-old students were killed, along with a school custodian, a substitute teacher, and the head of the school. CNN states that after searching Hale’s house, police found notebooks with writings stating that the attacks were planned, along with detailed maps of the school with key entrance points listed. There were also plans listed in the notebook to attack another location in the Nashville Metropolitan area. Hale had written down a plan on how to fight against the cops if she needed to. At the time of the shooting, Hale had been under care for an emotional disorder. 

Frighteningly, this isn’t close to the first mass shooting this year. The New York Times stated that a non-profit called the Gun Violence Archive, which records the number of mass-shootings per year, has counted this school shooting as the 130th mass shooting of 2023, setting a new record for this time of year. According to the BBC, the latest data from 2021 counted a record 48,830 gun-related deaths that year. For 2022 and 2023, the count will likely be higher.

The growing trend of mass shootings is something that worries many people, especially when it touches school communities. Nashville continues to deal with the impact of this devastating attack, and the nation will be mourning with them.