Ten people including the suspected shooter are dead and at least 25 others wounded after a mass shooting at a secondary school and a nearby home in Tumbler Ridge, a small town in northeastern British Columbia. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police said they were called to Tumbler Ridge Secondary School at approximately 1:20 p.m. on Tuesday after reports of an active shooter. Officers arrived within two minutes but found a scene of devastating carnage, with victims in a hallway and in the school library. Most of the students killed were born in 2012 and 2013, making them 12 or 13 years old. The school serves grades 7 through 12 and has approximately 175 students in a town of just 2,700 people located more than 1,000 kilometers north of Vancouver near the Alberta border.
Authorities identified the suspect as 18-year-old Jesse Van Rootselaar, who had dropped out of the school and was found dead from an apparent self-inflicted injury. Investigators determined that the attack began at a nearby residence where two members of the suspect's family, her mother Jennifer Strang and her sibling Emmett, were found dead. The suspect then traveled to the school armed with a long gun and a modified handgun. The RCMP said the suspect had previously held an expired firearms licence but had no guns registered in her name, and investigators are working to determine how the weapons were obtained.
Six people died at the school, one victim died while being transported to hospital, and two were found dead at the family home. Among the 25 injured, two female victims sustained life-threatening injuries and were airlifted to larger medical facilities. One person initially reported among the dead was later determined to be alive. The RCMP stated that their immediate response prevented further casualties, though the scale of the tragedy has left the small community in shock.
Prime Minister Mark Carney delivered an emotional statement, saying he joined Canadians in grieving with those whose lives have been changed irreversibly. A visibly tearful Carney called the shooting a senseless act of violence that struck at the heart of a close-knit community. British Columbia Premier David Eby urged the nation to wrap these families with love, not just tonight but tomorrow and in the difficult days ahead. Tumbler Ridge Mayor Darryl Krakowka said he broke down upon learning how many had died, describing the town as a place where everyone knows each other and where such violence was unimaginable.
The shooting is the deadliest mass killing in Canada since the 2020 Nova Scotia rampage that claimed 22 lives, and the second deadliest school shooting in Canadian history after the 1989 massacre at Montreal's Ecole Polytechnique that killed 14 people. School shootings remain rare in Canada compared to the United States, and the incident has already reignited debate about firearms access and mental health services in rural communities. The RCMP confirmed that the suspect had a history of mental health incidents, though the precise motive for the attack remains under investigation. Flags across Canada have been lowered to half-mast as the nation mourns the victims of what officials have called an unthinkable tragedy.
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