A mass shooting at the Kansas City Chiefs’ Super Bowl victory rally on Wednesday killed one person and injured 21, including children.
Shots went out moments after exuberant Chiefs players addressed a large, cheering crowd, sending stunned fans and VIPs fleeing in a terrible end to what had been a joyful morning of celebrating the NFL champs.
Police said three persons were arrested following the incident near Kansas City’s Union Station, but the motive for the shooting was yet unknown.
During a press conference, fire chief Ross Grundyson stated that many of the victims had “life-threatening injuries.”
Lisa Lopez, a local DJ, was slain in the attack, her radio station reported.
“This senseless act has taken a beautiful person from her family and the KC Community,” KKFI wrote on Facebook, referring to Kansas City.
Following the shooting, minors’s Mercy Hospital reported treating 12 persons, 11 of whom were minors and nine of them had sustained gunshot wounds. A hospital official said everyone was expected to recover.
Paul Contreras, who attended the event with his three kids, claimed he assaulted and disarmed one of the alleged shooters before police arrived.
“I got the right angle on him and I hit him from behind. And when I hit him from behind, I either jarred the gun out of his hand or out of his sleeve,” Contreras said on CNN. “I take him down, and I’m putting all my body weight on him. And then another good Samaritan comes over and is helping me.”
Victims were treated lying on the ground before being carried away on stretchers amid the commotion and the crowds, while the hundreds of police guarding the event rushed to clear the area.
Chiefs star Travis Kelce said he was “heartbroken.”
“My heart is with all who came out to celebrate with us and have been affected. KC, you mean the world to me,” he wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
“Praying for Kansas City,” quarterback Patrick Mahomes wrote on social media, while a statement from the team said they were “truly saddened by the senseless act of violence.”
US President Joe Biden issued a rallying call for Americans to back his pleas for Congress to enact gun reform, saying Wednesday’s shooting “cuts deep.”
“Today’s events should move us, shock us, shame us into acting,” Biden said in a White House statement.
He urged Americans to “make your voice heard in Congress so we finally act to ban assault weapons, to limit high-capacity magazines, strengthen background checks, keep guns out of the hands of those who have no business owning them or handling them.”
‘So depressingly American’
Just seconds before the shooting, Kelce and his teammates were basking in the praise of a sea of red-shirted fans.
There was no sign of danger as hundreds of thousands of partygoers cheered Chiefs players along a two-mile (three-kilometer) route in a procession of double-decker buses, surrounded by a blizzard of red and gold confetti.
More than one million people were expected to attend the parade, which took place in downtown Kansas City on an unusually sunny and warm day.
Mass shootings are prevalent in the United States, where guns outnumber people and roughly one-third of adults possess a handgun.
The attack in Kansas City was not the only shooting to make national headlines on Wednesday; four kids were shot outside an Atlanta high school, and three police officers were wounded during a standoff in Washington. All are expected to survive, according to media reports.
The shootings occurred exactly six years after 17 people were slain in a high school massacre in Parkland, Florida.
“There is something so depressingly American about experiencing a mass shooting at a Super Bowl celebration on the anniversary of another mass shooting,” wrote March For Our Lives, a student-led gun control advocacy group founded after the shooting in Parkland, a Miami suburb.
Although polls show that the majority of Americans support tougher gun controls, the formidable weapons lobby and mobilized voters who support the country’s culture of robust gun rights have consistently prevented politicians from taking action.
The Chiefs won their third Super Bowl title in five seasons on Sunday, defeating the San Francisco 49ers in Las Vegas.
The festivities did not include the team’s most famous supporter, music sensation Taylor Swift, whose relationship with beau Kelce has become a cultural phenomenon.
She was apparently on her way to Australia, where she is scheduled to perform in Melbourne on Friday.