Thousands Hold Vigil For School Shooting Victims In Austria

Thousands of people in Austria have held a candlelight vigil for the victims of a school shooting in which 10 people were killed.

Police said the 21-year-old suspect, a former student, took his own life in a school bathroom shortly after the gun attack in Graz on Tuesday – the deadliest in the country’s recent history.

In a statement on Wednesday, police said they found a “farewell letter” and a non-functional pipe bomb during a search of the suspect’s home. Authorities have not confirmed the gunman’s motive.

The incident, which left a further 12 people injured, took place at Dreierschützengasse secondary school in the north-west of the city.

Six females and three males were killed in the attack, and a seventh female died later in hospital. Austria’s APA news agency has reported that seven of those killed were pupils.

At the vigil on Tuesday night, Graz residents said they wanted to turn the city’s main square into a sea of candles, and that is what they did.

In the whispering silence, thousands of mostly young people gathered over the course of the evening, alone or clutching the arms or shoulders of their friends. They lit candles, cried, or stood for a while in prayer or contemplation.

Then they slowly came forward to hand candles to volunteers who arranged them carefully on the steps of the fountain.

The Archbishop Johann fountain is known as the heart of the old town of Graz, in front of the city hall. On Tuesday night it became a symbol of the grief, and solidarity, of the people of Austria.

A crowd is gathered in front of rows of lit candles in red and gold containers.

Three days of mourning have been declared in Austria, and a nationwide minute’s silence will be held on Wednesday at 10:00 local time in memory of the victims.

Flags on the Hofburg Palace in Vienna, where the President Alexander Van der Bellen has his office, will fly at half mast.

The school where the attack took place will remain closed until further notice.

Austrian Chancellor Christian Stocker said Tuesday was a “dark day in [the] history of our country” and declared the shooting a “national tragedy”.

The gunman, who has not yet been named, was a former Dreierschützengasse student who didn’t graduate from the school, Interior Minister Gerhard Karner told a news conference on Tuesday afternoon.

Karner added it was now the job of the criminal office to investigate.

Officers also confirmed the gunman was not known to police before the attack.

Current information suggests the shooter legally owned the two guns used in the attack and had a firearms licence, police added.

Local media outlets have reported the suspect used a pistol and a shotgun to carry out the shooting.

He was an Austrian man from the wider Graz region who acted alone, police said.

Police said they began an operation at 10:00 local time (09:00 BST) after gunshots were heard from inside the school.

A specialist Cobra tactical unit – which handles attacks and hostage situations – was deployed to the school, police said.

Authorities evacuated all pupils and teachers from the building. Police confirmed the school had been secured and there was no further danger posed to members of the public.

She told BBC News “everybody knows somebody” at the school because Graz – despite being the second-largest city in Austria – is “not that big”.

She said the school was likely unprepared for the possibility of an attack. “We are not living in America, we are living in Austria, which seems like a very safe space.”

European Commission Vice-President Kaja Kallas said she was “deeply shocked” by the news. “Every child should feel safe at school and be able to learn free from fear and violence,” she posted on X.

The pair later saw the students had “got out of the school on the ground floor, from the other side” where they “gathered on the street”, Franz said.

Another person standing in line told Reuters giving blood felt like the “only way possible to help”.

The incident is the deadliest mass shooting in the country’s recent history.

In 2020, jihadist gunman Kujtim Fejzulai shot four people dead and wounded 23 others on a rampage through Vienna’s busy nightlife district.

Meanwhile, in 2016, a gunman opened fire at a concert in the town of Nenzing, killing two people before shooting himself dead. Eleven other people were injured in the attack.