As ambulances attempted to reach victims at Robb Elementary, dozens of parked police vehicles blocked their path. Medical helicopters carrying blood were directed to wait at an airport 3 miles away.
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The chaotic scene exemplified the flawed medical response — captured in video footage, investigative documents, interviews and radio traffic — that experts said undermined the chances of survival for some victims of the May 24 massacre. Two teachers and 19 students died. The disjointed medical response frustrated medics while delaying efforts to get ambulances, air transport and other emergency services to victims. Medical helicopters with critical supplies of blood tried to land at the school, but an unidentified fire department official told them to wait at an airport 3 miles away. Dozens of parked police vehicles blocked the paths of ambulances trying to reach victims.
Uvalde EMS radio traffic “10-4 we are [inaudible] at Grove Street and Grove Street is blocked off by law enforcement.” Although helicopters were available, none were used to carry victims directly from the school. At least four patients who survived were flown by helicopter to a more fully equipped trauma center in San Antonio after first being driven by ambulance to a nearby hospital or airport.
The Texas Rangers, an arm of the state Department of Public Safety, are investigating what went wrong in Uvalde, including whether any victims might have survived if they had received prompt medical care. The local district attorney has said she will use that investigation to determine whether to charge anyone with a crime, including law enforcement officers.
The flawed coordination among police and medical crews echoes missteps during other mass shootings, despite the development of recommended practices after the 1999 massacre at Columbine High School. In several of those cases, the communication problems resulted in delays in getting medical care for victims.
“My dad had just told her how beautiful she looked,” Adalynn Ruiz, 23, recalled in a text message to a reporter.Courtesy of Lydia Martinez Delgado The gunman got there first, entering Mireles’ classroom and firing his AR-15-style rifle. Officers rushed into the school minutes later and approached her classroom, but they retreated after the gunman fired through the door, grazing two of them.
Inside Rooms 111 and 112, students anxiously tried to get officers’ attention. They knew that for Mireles, there was little time to spare.“We as a nation are not ready” “If you don’t have a system, the whole response goes awry,” said Bob Harrison, a former police chief and a homeland security researcher at the Rand Corp., a think tank based in California.
Experts said that the Uvalde shooting response appeared to lack both an overall incident commander and someone clearly in charge of coordinating the emergency medical response. It’s unclear what information Stephens had about how many victims first responders should expect to find. Multiple medics expressed confusion over who was in charge of the medical response and where to go.
The city of Uvalde did not respond to detailed questions about the communication between police and medics or about its training for mass shootings, citing ongoing litigation. But a spokesperson said in an email that the city’s police department has not conducted any formal training with Uvalde EMS, a nonprofit that provides emergency medical services for the city and county.
“We didn’t know the numbers of patients, number of injuries, number of fatalities,” Martinez recalled in interviews with investigators. “Nobody was relaying that.”The crew of an AirLIFE helicopter grounded in Uvalde for maintenance heard the unfolding chaos on the radio and offered to help. The crew later told investigators that the emergency responders they talked to had rejected their assistance repeatedly. They did not provide the names of those responders.
One local medic later complained to investigators that the response was so chaotic that emergency crews were stepping on victims. A girl matching the description of Jackie — wearing the same red shirt and black shorts she’d had on earlier in the day — was placed in one of the two ambulances at the school. The 9-year-old, described by her family as a “firecracker” for being so full of life, died on the way to the hospital.
The child seen in the police body-camera footage fits the description of Xavier. A law enforcement document listing what students were wearing indicates that Xavier had on a black shirt, blue jeans and black-and-white shoes. That is similar to the clothing worn by the boy Aviles was treating, the officer video shows.Courtesy of Felicha Martinez
“I was like, ‘Guys, he’s …,’” Aviles said, pausing for a moment to take a breath as he spoke with investigators. “That took the wind out of my sails.” Reached on his cellphone, Aviles declined to comment, referring questions to his supervisors at U.S. Customs and Border Protection. In a statement, a CBP spokesperson said the agency is investigating the role of its officers in the response and could not comment while that was ongoing.
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