Gunman kills 32 students, faculty members at Virginia University

Washington, Apr 17 (UNI) President George W Bush and both Houses of Congress led the nation in mourning the deaths of 32 students and faculty members at Virginia Tech University yesterday in what is being described as the deadliest mass shooting rampage in US history.

About 30 others were injured and admitted to areas hospitals for treatment.

The gunman, believed to be responsible for the massacre on the 2,600-acre campus, about 150 miles from here, killed himself as the police closed in.

The Washington Post quoted witnesses describing the shooter as a young man of Asian descent -- a silent killer who was calm and showed no expression as he pursued and shot his victims. His name has not been released so far. Nor is his intention known.

The University suspended classes for yesterday and today and set up counseling for the grief-stricken campus.

The victims' names have not been released, pending notification to their families.

Virginia Tech President Charles Steger says the University will hold a convocation today to commemorate victims of the tragedy.

''I'm really at a loss for words to explain or to understand the carnage that has visited our campus,'' he said.

According to reports, the gunman first opened fire in coed dormitory, then stormed Norris Hall and a classroom building, a half-mile away on the other side of the campus. Some of the doors at Norris Hall were found chained from the inside, apparently by the gunman. Students jumped from windows in panic.

Two people died in a dorm room, and 30 others were killed in Norris Hall.

The gunman also ended his life there.

The United States witnessed its first campus massacre in 1966, when a sniper shot and killed 16 people at the University of Texas.

In 1999, 12 students and a teacher were killed by two boys at Columbine High School in the Littleton, Colorado. In October 2006, an armed gunman killed six girls in a one-room Amish schoolhouse in rural Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.

UNI