Inside the Georgia high school where a sleepy morning was pierced by gunfire

Content warning: This story contains descriptions of violence. Reader discretion is advised

WINDER, Ga. -- It was the middle of second period at Apalachee High School, and the boy who few knew slipped out of his algebra class in J Hall again. That didn't strike his fellow students as unusual.

“He got up sometime in the morning, and class continued as normal,” Lyela Sayarath said. “He was probably just skipping.”

Many teenagers weren't quite awake on Wednesday morning at the high school near Winder, in rapidly suburbanizing Barrow County. Junior Julie Sandoval was dozing in her physics class as other students caught up on work. Sophomore Jacob King also dozed off, in world history, after a morning football practice.

But soon, terror and panic erupted as authorities say Colt Gray, the 14-year-old student who left class, returned to the hallway with a semiautomatic assault-style rifle and opened fire. Four people were killed and nine more hurt, seven of them shot, in the latest school shooting to shock the nation.

Gray is charged with four counts of murder. Authorities haven't said yet where he got the weapon, how he brought it to campus or what he did with it in the two hours between school starting at 8:15 a.m. and when shots first rang out around 10:20 a.m.

Law enforcement hasn't said whether Gray was being sought before the shooting. “We’re still trying to clarify a lot of the timeline,” Georgia Bureau of Investigation Director Chris Hosey said Wednesday.

On Thursday, officials also arrested his father, Colin Gray, and charged him with involuntary manslaughter, second-degree murder and cruelty to children, saying he knowingly allowed his son to possess a gun.

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At first, students thought it was a drill

At the school on Wednesday morning, the alert was sounded when several teachers set off their wearable panic buttons, which Sheriff Jud Smith said were distributed to staff only days earlier. That sparked a lockdown, and immediately a warning flashed on classroom smartboards across the sprawling school.

“The screen ... said ‘hard lockdown’ in big red words, and the top light started flashing,” said Layla Ferrell, a junior who was in a food and nutrition class in another hall.

Many thought it was a drill. Georgia schools are required to complete at least one active shooter drill by Oct. 1 each year.

“I thought it was fake until my friend told me it wasn’t fake,” King said. He added, “They weren’t really acting like it was real.”

Some heard what sounded like a loud, metallic crash.

“It sounded more like punching a locker at first,” Ferrell said.

But those in J Hall had no doubt.

Students fled or hid under desks

Sayarath said that when the suspect tried to return to class, a student saw what warrants describe as “black semi-automatic AR-15 style rifle” and refused to let him in. Classroom doors at the school lock automatically and must be opened from inside, a “hardening” precaution in America’s era of school shootings.

Kaylee Abner, a sophomore, said a student who left her geometry class to take a test elsewhere came racing back.

“She ran back inside, shuts the door and then we hear three gunshots,” Abner said.

Junior Landon Culver got a glimpse of the shooter after leaving algebra II.

“I was walking out to get water and I heard gunshots and I heard bullets going like by my head,” Culver said. “It looked like he was wearing a black hoodie and he had a AR and, I just, I didn’t really stick around too long to look.”

Marques Coleman Jr. told The Washington Post that the shooter leaned inside an open door of his algebra classroom and sprayed it with gunfire, hitting people including Christian Angulo, who died. Others were shot in the hall.

Senior Kassidy Reed was retaking a test in a hallway when she heard shots from around the corner. A teacher told everyone to flee.

“He got us up and told us to run because our classroom door was shut and it was locked, so we couldn’t get in there,” Reed said.

A teacher across the hall opened the door to her chemistry classroom, and the students ran inside. “I hid under a lab table,” Reed said.

Teachers turned out lights and herded students into corners or behind desks. Classroom furniture became makeshift barricades.

“We put desks and chairs against our door and built it up so that nobody could get in, and then we were all just quiet, waiting,” Ferrell said.

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They sent chilling messages to family members

Authorities say the suspect fatally shot students Angulo and Mason Schermerhorn, both 14, and teachers Richard Aspinwall, 39, and Cristina Irimie, 53. The nine who were hurt — eight students and a teacher — are expected to recover.

One of the three school resource officers on campus quickly tracked down the shooter, who gave up and was taken into custody, the sheriff said.

Some students said they heard shouts from an officer ordering the shooter to halt and put his gun down.

“I heard the 'Get down! Get down! Don't move!' Reed said. Then, the sound of a “scuffle” as the suspect was handcuffed.

But the terror wasn't over.

Students said some students and teachers took off their clothes to try to stanch bleeding from gunshot wounds.

Deputies with guns drawn searched classroom by classroom for any more wounded, as well as any other possible shooters.

As students huddled, they called and texted each other and their parents. More than a few sent what they feared would be farewells.

“I love you. I love you so much. Ma I love you,” a crying Sandoval texted. “I’m sorry I’m not the best daughter. I love you.”

Sandoval’s mother wrote back in Spanish to say everything would be all right and she should trust in God.

“We started praying, because we didn’t know whether we would come out alive or not,” said Michelle Moncada, a freshman who was in art class.

Nearby, Sandoval said, another student was on the phone with their mother: “They’re shooting up the school! They’re shooting up the school!”

Abner held the hand of a boy who was praying.

“I was just trying to think happy thoughts, trying not to think anything negative,” she said.

Parents abandoned cars and ran to the school

The hundreds of panicked parents who raced to the school created a traffic jam along the two-lane roads near Apalachee High. Many abandoned their cars and ran toward campus.

Shannon Callahan, Ferrell's mother, said her daughter texted a photo of her barricaded under a table. “Once the texts stopped, I was 100-per-cent completely worried.”

During the evacuation, King saw the body of what appeared to a student on the floor. “They were blocking the body,” King said.

Abner also saw what appeared to be female student who had been shot, in the shoulder. She was leaning against a wall as emergency personnel attended to her.

Another female student was lying on the floor and covering her eyes, Abner said: “I don’t know if she was dead or shot or something, or just processing.”

Reed saw a gun on the floor, and blood.

As they fled, students abandoned bookbags, phones, even shoes. Ferrell lost her rainbow Crocs and later made the long walk to her mother's car in her socks.

Gathered inside the football stadium, students wept and milled around.

“Everyone is crying, everyone is walking around,” Moncada said. “They’re all running around trying to see who’s OK and who’s not.”

By early afternoon, students began to be released to parents to go home.

But Culver and others said the sound of gunfire will stick with them forever.

“You could hear gunshots, like just ringing out through the school,” Culver said. “And you’re just wondering, which one of those is going to be somebody that you’re best friends with or somebody that you love?”

Associated Press writer Charlotte Kramon contributed.