Survivor Says Principal, Others Saved Her in U.S. School Rampage. [View all]

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Source: nyt/reuters

A survivor of the elementary school massacre in Connecticut that killed 26 people said on Sunday the principal and two staff members had saved her and others' lives by warning that a gunman was in the building.

Becky Virgalla, a reading consultant at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, said she was in a meeting with Principal Dawn Hochsprung, school psychologist Mary Sherlach and other colleagues when the shooter broke into the building on December 14.

Hochsprung, Sherlach and lead teacher Natalie Hammond "went out in the hall to check out the noise that we didn't know that was gunshots at first," Virgalla told Reuters Television at a memorial where the names of the victims were written on wooden angels.

"The three of them were shot and they yelled back 'shooter, stay put.' And they saved my life and the life of four others who were at that meeting," she said.

Virgalla had some advice for parents and teachers: make sure your doors lock from the inside.

"Ours did not and teachers had to go out. You can't be out in a hall when a shooter is present in your school. Just that simple thing could make a difference in time and safety of the children," she said.



Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2012/12/23/arts/23reuters-usa-shooting-connecticut.html?hp