Florida School Shooting: 9-1-1 Cries For Help

PARKLAND, FL — As the chaotic first seconds ticked away during the Valentine's Day massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, the emotionally disturbed gunman squeezed shot after shot from his AR-15 rifle unchallenged as callers choked the 9-1-1 switchboards with pleas for help — 71 to the Broward Sheriff's Office and another 86 to Coral Springs police. Puffs of smoke rose with every trigger pull as the smell of gunpowder wafted through the halls and hot bullet casings clanged onto the corridors and stairwells of Building 12. Outside, police officers were mounting their response for what must have seemed like an endless 11 minutes and 15 seconds to the frightened survivors huddled in closets and under desks.

Three weeks after the Florida high school shooting, the Broward Sheriff's Office has released its most detailed timeline to date as well as a sampling of 10 chilling 9-1-1 recordings from the worst such shooting since a gunman opened fire in Sandy Hook Elementary School.

Calls came in from frantic parents. From scared students jammed into closets. From other students with nowhere to hide.

The first shots rang out 33 seconds after the clock struck 2:21 p.m. That was 15 seconds after accused gunman Nikolas Cruz entered Building 12 and 14 minutes after he was dropped off by a "small goldish colored" Uber on the 45-acre campus.

He would pump out shot after shot for 6 minutes and 22 seconds before escaping through a stairwell on the west side of the building.

Broward Sheriff's Deputy Scot Peterson had been in the administration building dealing with a female student when the shooting began. At first he thought he might have heard fireworks but soon realized it was gunshots.

But were they outside? He said later that he couldn't tell at first.

One minute and five seconds into the shooting, the school's fire alarm sounded in Building 12 and all the buildings on campus.

Three seconds after the fire alarm went off, the first frantic call was coming into the Coral Springs 9-1-1 operator.

"I just got a call from Douglas High School. A female on the line advised me to believe there is a shooter at the school," relayed a male dispatcher from Coral Springs to a BSO dispatcher in one call. "It sounded like possible shots in the background. I think I heard five or six in two different bursts."

The 9-1-1 calls came from parents, grandparents and in one case a man who said he was texting with the little sister of his fiancee. Operators tried to make sense of the frantic calls and text messages they were receiving from Stoneman Douglas students hiding in the auditorium and classrooms of the freshman building.

"I got another caller advising someone was shot in the 1200 building," the Coral Springs dispatcher added seconds later. "They're still hearing gunshots on multiple calls."

By then there was only one confirmed victim. By the end of the six-minute rampage there would be 17 dead and 16 wounded.

"My son is in Stoneman Douglas High School. He said he heard noises and pops and he thinks there's a shooting going on at the school," exclaimed a mother, who called about her 11th grader locked in his math class.

The operator responded: "Police is on scene there."

"Is it secure?" the mother pressed.

"We don't have that information as yet," the female dispatcher conceded.

The mother let out a deep sigh.

The calls show the initial confusion as the chaotic scene unfolded in the affluent Parkland community, which is about 50 miles from Miami. A male inside the school, possibly a student, whispers, “There’s shots at Stoneman Douglas, Someone is shooting up the school at Stoneman Douglas.”

“I’m sorry. I can’t hear you. What’s happening?” the dispatcher responds.

“Someone is shooting up Marjory Stoneman Douglas” he whispers. She still can’t hear him, “Hello ... hello ... hello.”

But soon a sense of order begins to emerge among the Broward dispatchers and they start giving instructions on keeping the students safe. Just 13 months earlier, the same 9-1-1 center had handled a mass shooting at Fort Lauderdale’s airport that left six dead.

In a call relayed from nearby Boca Raton, lasting more than 16 minutes, a man reports information from a mother standing beside him. She’s on another line with her daughter, who is in a classroom with just one other girl. They have no closet or enclosed desks to hide behind.

The 9-1-1 dispatcher soon instructs the man to tell the girls to remain silent and turn off their cellphone ringers in case the shooter is nearby.

As the call drags on, the mother can be heard in the background encouraging the girl, who hears noises in the hallway. “I love you, I love you. It’s going to be fine if you hide somewhere. Can you play dead? You need to fake dead,” the mother tells the girl.

Seconds later, officers burst into the room and the girls are safe. The mother can be heard telling her daughter, “Tell them to pray, tell them to pray for strength.” The two girls are led out and the call ends.

The operator sighs, “’Oh, my God.”

Outside the freshman building, Peterson makes his first radio call almost two minutes after Cruz opened fire. “Be advised we have possible, could be firecrackers, I think we have shots fired, possible shots fired,” he tells dispatchers. Investigators say 18 seconds later he took up a position near the building and remained there for several minutes. His subsequent transmissions focus on getting nearby streets and the school shutdown and keeping deputies away from the building.

Deputies set up a perimeter. Broward Sheriff Scott Israel later says Peterson should have charged into the building and killed Cruz. President Trump would say the deputy was a coward.

Peterson, who has defended his actions, retired rather than accept a suspension.

By now, students are flooding out of the school. Some are told not to look at the dead bodies as they step around them. Their arms are raised up over their heads so they won't be shot by their rescuers.

Officers from nearby Coral Springs are arriving to assist deputies. Soon, their calls appear to be more aggressively assessing what they face.

About this time Cruz allegedly discards his jammed gun. His burgundy hoodie from his days as a member of the school’s Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps allows him to mix into the fleeing mass and get away. At one point police stop a student who matches the description and make him sit with a female police officer for hours.

Deputies and officers begin finding the first victims outside the building. A student is shot in the leg. Another wounded by an entrance, another in the parking lot. A staff member is not moving.

By the time someone dared to enter the three-story freshman building at 48 seconds past 2:32 p.m., the gunman had already slipped past Peterson and the freshman building's interior surveillance cameras. Officers were initially told to be on the lookout for a male shooter wearing an ROTC uniform and a burgundy shirt.

Eleven minutes and 15 seconds after Cruz first fired — five minutes after he fled — four Coral Springs officers and Broward deputies Volpe and Hanks — enter the freshman building through the west door. More deputies and officers soon follow. They find bodies. They find frightened teenagers huddling in classrooms.

Another mother on a 9-1-1 call hears her daughter’s rescue but then exclaims, “Three shot in her room. Oh my God. Oh my God.”

An hour and 19 minutes after the first shots were fired — an hour and 13 minutes after Cruz left the building — 47 minutes after Cruz bought a soda at Walmart, Coconut Creek police officer Michael Leonard turns onto a quiet suburban street about a mile south of the school. He spots a teen wearing a burgundy hoodie walking. He yells at Cruz to get on the ground.

The officer later acknowledged that he thought twice about stopping Cruz, whose attorney filed court papers on Thursday saying he is withdrawing a preliminary not-guilty plea and will enter no plea at all. Assistant Public Defender Melisa McNeill said in the filing that Cruz “stands mute” before the court. She said the not-guilty plea was entered prematurely, before a grand jury formally indicted Cruz on Wednesday.

Deputy Peterson stood as the lone police officer outside Building 12 for most of the six minutes as the gunman fired at the students and faculty members. Peterson had his service handgun with him but never fired it.

The Associated Press contributed to this article.

Frightened students wait for parents outside Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School after the Valentine's Day attack that left 17 dead and 16 wounded. Photo by Paul Scicchitano.