Nine people are dead Wednesday morning following a mass shooting at a rail yard in San Jose.
At 6:34 a.m., law enforcement responded to the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) light rail maintenance yard near the intersection of Younger Avenue and San Pedro Street for reports of a shooting, according to the San Jose Police Department. Less than two hours after SJPD officers initially responded to the scene, the incident’s management was transferred to to the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Department.
According SCCSD, the shooter was a VTA employee. Eight victims were killed during the mass shooting. SCCSD first reported that the shooter died at 8:08 a.m. The shooter’s cause of death has not been released.
“This is a very dark moment for our city and for our community but we have already seen how people are pulling together in this very, very tough time.,” San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo said in a news conference following the shooting.
Mayor Liccardo told CBS San Francisco that one victim died on the way to the hospital. Another victim was transported to the hospital in critical condition, according to Valley Medical Center spokesperson Joy Alexiou.
According to SCCSD spokesperson Deputy Russell Davis, explosive devices were found on the railyard property and a bomb squad responded to the scene to investigation. Additionally, a house fire that ignited around the time of the shooting incident is being linked to the shooting incident.
The fire, which was reported at a single-family home on the 1100 block Angmar Court warranted a 2-alarm response at 6:36 a.m., according to the San Jose Fire Department. The fire was knocked down by 7:27 a.m. No firefighters or civilians were injured due to the blaze. The blaze caused ‘heavy’ damage to the structure and it has now been deemed uninhabitable.
A re-unification center for families of workers at the rail yard was set up at the Isaac Newton building at 70 West Hedding Street in San Jose Wednesday morning.
