A Shooting at Brown

"This was my experience on Saturday afternoon, in Providence, when an unidentified man in his twenties or thirties, dressed in black, opened fire in a classroom in the Barus and Holley engineering-and-physics building at Brown, the university where I teach. I was at home, just eight blocks away, at 4:22 P.M., when I received an automated call telling me that there was an active shooter in the vicinity. A text followed:"

"BrownUAlert: 1st, Urgent: There's an active shooter near Barus & Holley Engineering. Lock doors, silence phones and stay stay (sic) hidden until further notice. Remember: RUN, if you are in the affected location, evacuate safely if you can; HIDE, if evacuation is not possible, take cover; FIGHT, as a last resort, take action to protect yourself. Stay tuned for further safety information."

Snowfall usually brings students together; this year students were united in a very different way. An unidentified man in his twenties or thirties, dressed in black, opened fire in a classroom in the Barus and Holley engineering-and-physics building at Brown University. Automated calls and texts warned of an active shooter and instructed recipients to lock doors, silence phones, run if possible, hide if necessary, or fight as a last resort. The proximity of the violence compressed a sense of unreality into familiar spaces. A prior campus alert had described someone detained by a federal agent, later identified as a legitimate officer, which shaped initial assumptions and uneasy calm.

Read at The New Yorker