This hour, five years ago.
For Dunblaneians it is 13 March 1996. For Littletonians it is 20 April 1999. And when I began to write this, I didn't know that yet another date would be added: 16 April 2007.
For Erfurters it is 26 April 2002. That was the day an 18-year-old, who had been sent down from the school some months ago, walked into his old school near the city centre, packing a pumpgun and a pistol, and opened fire.
Fifteen minutes later, 17 people were dead. 12 teachers, two pupils, a school secretary and a constable of the first police car that arrived at the scene. Within minutes, more police and an ERT team arrived at the school, and for more than two hours the pupils had to stay put inside classrooms, while the ERT combed the building, finally finding the amok shooter dead in a locked room, with an additional 500 rounds in his bag. A teacher had confronted him, pushed him in the maps room and locked the door.
That is something one hears/sees in the news, reads in newspapers. I first heard about it about half an hour after it happened, when a colleague came in and said "There's been a hostage-taking at the Gutenberggymnasium". We talked about it for a while, but were sure the police would handle it well, as they mostly do in such cases, and everybody would be home for coffee.
I periodically checked a local news site on the internet, but there was only the info that a policeman had been shot from inside the building. And then, shortly after noon, the whammy: "18 people dead after amok run in school." And the infos began to come in. Our managing director had collected his wife in the morning (a teacher at the school) to visit his son (a pupil at the school), who was in hospital with a broken arm. When his wife heard of the incident, she had a breakdown: Her substitute had been shot. The daughter of another colleague was trapped inside the school. People went to the school to offer help (by early afternoon the school had been cleared and tents for the pupils and teachers put up on the yard and sport area. Neighbours and townspeople volunteered for crisis intervention). And of course, the press descended like vultures.
The press. They were so bad, that a few days later the mayor breathed fire and brimstone and announced he would personally go after each journalist that would go near the funerals.
The next morning I went into town to run some errands. I have never experienced anything like it. Erfurt is a town of 200.000, and on saturdays the town centre is packed. It was packed, alright, but you could hear --nothing. Quiet. Quiet. Quiet. People were actually whispering, and there were groups of teenagers, some of them obviously from Gutenberggymnasium. They huddled, hugged each other, some cried... Somebody had placed flowers in front of the city hall, and gradually the flowers took over the entrance to the city hall, when people brought more flowers, handwritten notes and letters and drawings. On 3 May, over 100,000 people came to the memorial service.
I wouldn't go near that school for the first few days. Because of the press. There were masses of national and international stations, complete with satellite dishes and caravans. The poor pupils and families were interviewed whenever the press could lay hands on them. Five days later, when only a single news agency was left with their car, I finally went to put some flowers near the door. Except there was no way to get near the door. The steps leading in and the yard in front were covered in flowers. Again, there were drawings, letters and photos laid down. A box with a note "Macht kaputt, was Euch kaputtmacht!" ("Destroy that which is destroying you!") contained a number of broken game CDs and cheating scripts for computer games. The amok shooter had been an avid player of ego-shooter games. There were dozens of people there, citizens of the city, pupils, parents, teachers of the school, at any given time during the day, talking with others, trying to grasp what had happened. I went to the back of the school and looked through the gate. There were two cars on the schoolyard, one of them a yellow new Beetle. A girl that went with me, said "This car belonged to Mrs. X. She only got it a short time ago."
Every one of us has little things he remembers from that day. Our local paper has been publishing them during the last few weeks, together with portraits of the teachers and pupils killed. Today there will be a service at the school. Over a year ago, I taped a documentary about the aftermath, but I haven't watched it yet. Maybe I will tonight.
For Erfurters it is 26 April 2002. That was the day an 18-year-old, who had been sent down from the school some months ago, walked into his old school near the city centre, packing a pumpgun and a pistol, and opened fire.
Fifteen minutes later, 17 people were dead. 12 teachers, two pupils, a school secretary and a constable of the first police car that arrived at the scene. Within minutes, more police and an ERT team arrived at the school, and for more than two hours the pupils had to stay put inside classrooms, while the ERT combed the building, finally finding the amok shooter dead in a locked room, with an additional 500 rounds in his bag. A teacher had confronted him, pushed him in the maps room and locked the door.
That is something one hears/sees in the news, reads in newspapers. I first heard about it about half an hour after it happened, when a colleague came in and said "There's been a hostage-taking at the Gutenberggymnasium". We talked about it for a while, but were sure the police would handle it well, as they mostly do in such cases, and everybody would be home for coffee.
I periodically checked a local news site on the internet, but there was only the info that a policeman had been shot from inside the building. And then, shortly after noon, the whammy: "18 people dead after amok run in school." And the infos began to come in. Our managing director had collected his wife in the morning (a teacher at the school) to visit his son (a pupil at the school), who was in hospital with a broken arm. When his wife heard of the incident, she had a breakdown: Her substitute had been shot. The daughter of another colleague was trapped inside the school. People went to the school to offer help (by early afternoon the school had been cleared and tents for the pupils and teachers put up on the yard and sport area. Neighbours and townspeople volunteered for crisis intervention). And of course, the press descended like vultures.
The press. They were so bad, that a few days later the mayor breathed fire and brimstone and announced he would personally go after each journalist that would go near the funerals.
The next morning I went into town to run some errands. I have never experienced anything like it. Erfurt is a town of 200.000, and on saturdays the town centre is packed. It was packed, alright, but you could hear --nothing. Quiet. Quiet. Quiet. People were actually whispering, and there were groups of teenagers, some of them obviously from Gutenberggymnasium. They huddled, hugged each other, some cried... Somebody had placed flowers in front of the city hall, and gradually the flowers took over the entrance to the city hall, when people brought more flowers, handwritten notes and letters and drawings. On 3 May, over 100,000 people came to the memorial service.
I wouldn't go near that school for the first few days. Because of the press. There were masses of national and international stations, complete with satellite dishes and caravans. The poor pupils and families were interviewed whenever the press could lay hands on them. Five days later, when only a single news agency was left with their car, I finally went to put some flowers near the door. Except there was no way to get near the door. The steps leading in and the yard in front were covered in flowers. Again, there were drawings, letters and photos laid down. A box with a note "Macht kaputt, was Euch kaputtmacht!" ("Destroy that which is destroying you!") contained a number of broken game CDs and cheating scripts for computer games. The amok shooter had been an avid player of ego-shooter games. There were dozens of people there, citizens of the city, pupils, parents, teachers of the school, at any given time during the day, talking with others, trying to grasp what had happened. I went to the back of the school and looked through the gate. There were two cars on the schoolyard, one of them a yellow new Beetle. A girl that went with me, said "This car belonged to Mrs. X. She only got it a short time ago."
Every one of us has little things he remembers from that day. Our local paper has been publishing them during the last few weeks, together with portraits of the teachers and pupils killed. Today there will be a service at the school. Over a year ago, I taped a documentary about the aftermath, but I haven't watched it yet. Maybe I will tonight.