Shooting at Connecticut Elementary School

[Content Note: Violence; guns.]

There has been another shooting, this time at a public elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut. There are several reportedly wounded; the shooter is dead. No other deaths have been reported or confirmed.

The alleged gunman at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn., is dead, a state official briefed on the incident told NBC News.

Two handguns were recovered from the scene. It was not clear if other adults were injured, the official told NBC's Jonathan Dienst. The official had no information about any children being hurt at Sandy Hook Elementary School.

A spokeswoman for nearby Danbury Hospital told NBC Connecticut that three people were taken there. The spokeswoman would not elaborate on the ages of the victims or their conditions.

The Newtown Bee reported that one child, apparently wounded, was carried from the scene by a police officer.

My heart is breaking for all the children who had to experience this terror. And the adults at the school, too, and all the parents—I can't even imagine the fear. I desperately hope there are no other casualties.

I don't know what else to say. I'm really angry that this keeps happening.

UPDATE: There are now reports of multiple deaths, including children. Maybe as many as a dozen. I hope that the reports are wrong, and fear that they aren't.

UPDATE 2: There were two gunmen, one of whom is still currently at large. "Multiple federal and state sources" have told ABC News that "more than a dozen people including school children are dead." I am without words.

UPDATE 3: "More than 20 people, most of them young children, killed in elementary school shooting, according to law enforcement sources." Per ABC's live update. Oh god.

UPDATE 4: ABC says as many as 25 dead. AP is currently reporting 27, 18 of whom are children. I feel sick.

UPDATE 5: There are reports one of the shooters may have been a father of one of the students at the school. ABC News is separately reporting, according to unspecified sources: "One shooter is 24-year-old, was armed with four weapons and wearing a bullet-proof vest." There is no information about whether that shooter was related to any of the students.

UPDATE 6: White House Spokesperson Jay Carney says today isn't the day to talk about gun reform: "I think it's important on a day like today to view this as I know the president, as a father does and I as a father and others who are parents certainly do, which is to feel enormous sympathy for families that are affected and to do everything we can to support state and local law enforcement and support those who are enduring what appears to be a very tragic event. There is, I'm sure, will be, rather, a day for discussion of the usual Washington policy debates but I don't think today is that day."

UPDATE 7: And this is where I lose it completely (Libor Jany is a NewsTimes reporter, who was tweeting from the scene):

9 y/o girl says that "police with big guns" led her classmates out of the building. Asked them to cover their eyes.

— Libor Jany (@ljanyNT) December 14, 2012

UPDATE 8: Per the police press conference, not all the families know yet. OMG. More information will be forthcoming about the shooter(s) and casualties once all the families have been informed. Sob.

UPDATE 9: Reports about two shooters are being revised, and it is now assumed that there was one shooter, a 20-year-old man. There are additional reports that someone associated with/related to the shooter has been found dead off-site.

UPDATE 10: Via the Guardian:

From AP, Richard Wilford, parent of a student at Sandy Hook who was not shot, said:

"I could try to explain it, but I'm sure I would fail. There's no words that I could come up with that would even come close to describing the sheer terror of hearing that your son is in a place, or your child's in a place, where there's been violence. You don't know the details of that violence, you don't know the condition of your child and you can't do anything to immediately help them or protect them. It is a powerless and terrifying experience."

UPDATE 11: The shooter has been identified as Ryan Lanza, a 24-year-old resident of "Hoboken, New Jersey with Facebook checkins in Newtown, Connecticut." He is reportedly a registered Republican. CBS is reporting that his mother was a teacher at the school, and that he killed students in her classroom.

UPDATE 12: Apparently the wrong Ryan Lanza's FB profile is being circulated.

UPDATE 13: There is already SO MUCH "don't talk about gun reform" bullshit going on, even, as noted earlier, from the White House. Here is a good point:

You know who else isn’t talking about gun violence today? 27 people who were shot in Connecticut, because they’re dead.

— Jamison Foser (@jamisonfoser) December 14, 2012

UPDATE 14: To expand on a note in Update 11, Lanza's mother was apparently a kindergarten teacher, and most of the dead children were in her class. I am already dreading the inevitable blaming, the accusations that she should have done something to prevent this. She is going to get all the bad mother shaming imaginable, irrespective of whether she is alive or dead.

UPDATE 15: Per Think Progress, Lanza's mother was one of the people he killed. Along with most of her students. He really showed her, huh? Fucking piece of shit.

UPDATE 16: Further updates will be posted in comments here.