Students at Forest High School in Ocala recall a harrowing Friday morning
It was Friday morning, first period, English III. Spenser Twardoski, 17, and his classmates had just recited the Pledge of Allegiance.
Then, all of a sudden, Twardoski heard a loud bang. A boy jumped up onto a table and screamed that he had been hit.
A teacher came from an adjacent classroom, gathered the students, and had them hide with the lights turned off.
That account was one of many emerging Friday in the wake of the Forest High School shooting. Spenser’s 17-year-old classmate was injured, and a 19-year-old former student was taken into custody.
When ninth-grader Lauren Guinn heard the shot, she and her classmates stacked desks to form a wall and tied some cord from the classroom doorknob to a desk so the door could not be opened.
“I was just hoping he wasn’t going to kill no one,” Lauren said.
Senior Ashley Tucker was in her first period psychology class when she heard a Code Red called. She thought it was a drill.
Ashley said the teacher had the students pile their desks, file cabinets — anything they could move — against the door of their second-floor classroom.
He also tied all their jackets together to form a rope, “just in case.”
Ashley said she had heard the shot, but thought it was a vending machine falling over. Then, she said, she could hear students screaming in another classroom.
It was Friday morning, first period, English III. Spenser Twardoski, 17, and his classmates had just recited the Pledge of Allegiance.
Then, all of a sudden, Twardoski heard a loud bang. A boy jumped up onto a table and screamed that he had been hit.
A teacher came from an adjacent classroom, gathered the students, and had them hide with the lights turned off.
That account was one of many emerging Friday in the wake of the Forest High School shooting. Spenser’s 17-year-old classmate was injured, and a 19-year-old former student was taken into custody.
When ninth-grader Lauren Guinn heard the shot, she and her classmates stacked desks to form a wall and tied some cord from the classroom doorknob to a desk so the door could not be opened.
“I was just hoping he wasn’t going to kill no one,” Lauren said.
Senior Ashley Tucker was in her first period psychology class when she heard a Code Red called. She thought it was a drill.
Ashley said the teacher had the students pile their desks, file cabinets — anything they could move — against the door of their second-floor classroom.
He also tied all their jackets together to form a rope, “just in case.”
Ashley said she had heard the shot, but thought it was a vending machine falling over. Then, she said, she could hear students screaming in another classroom.
