A woman who police believed was the shooter was found dead, apparently from a self-inflicted wound, police said. The motive remained unclear.
More than 25 people were wounded Tuesday in the attack in the small mountain community of Tumbler Ridge, including two with life-threatening injuries who were airlifted for medical care, police said.
The village of 2,700 people in the Canadian Rockies is more than 600 miles northeast of Vancouver, near the provincial border with Alberta.
“Parents, grandparents, sisters, brothers in Tumbler Ridge will wake up without someone they love. The nation mourns with you, and Canada stands by you,” an emotional Prime Minister Mark Carney said as he arrived in Parliament.
The attack was Canada’s deadliest rampage since 2020, when a gunman in Nova Scotia killed 13 people and set fires that left another nine dead.
British Columbia Premier David Eby told reporters that police reached the school within two minutes.
A video showed students walking out with their hands raised as police vehicles surrounded the building and a helicopter circled overhead.
Police found six people dead, Royal Canadian Mounted Police Superintendent Ken Floyd said. A seventh person died while being transported to a hospital, and two more were found dead at a residence that authorities believe was connected to the attack.
The Rev. George Rowe of the Tumbler Ridge Fellowship Baptist Church went to the recreation center where victims’ families were awaiting more information.
“It was not a pretty sight. Families are still waiting to hear if it’s their child that’s deceased and because of protocol and procedure, the investigating team is very careful in releasing names,” Rowe said Tuesday.
Rowe once taught at the high school, and his three children graduated from there.
“To walk through the corridors of that school will never be the same again,” he said.
The school district said the high school and elementary school will be closed for the rest of the week.
