A Minneapolis couple who live a block from Annunciation Catholic School and the church where two children were killed and 18 other people were wounded Wednesday recalled the moments after they heard the gunfire from their home.
Carla and Pedro Maldonado were in their kitchen when they heard the shots and realized after the second round that they were coming from the school.
“I didn’t want to believe at first that it was gunshots, but immediately my husband knew,” Carla Maldonado said Thursday on NBC News’ “Stay Tuned Now.”
She took off toward the back of the school as her husband started driving toward the front. As she was running, Carla said, she came across another mother who lives nearby.
“I felt something ricochet, hit my ankle, and thought, ‘There’s no way that’s fireworks,’” she said. Then her friend remarked that someone had a gun.
“She had a visual on the shooter, and immediately after that, we ran into her house,” she added.
Pedro said he got to the scene before police and directed the arriving officers to the back, where he said the shooter was. He said he entered the church, next to the school, after the doors were opened. At first, he did not see any children because they were on the ground, but then he started to see some, who were injured, emerge.
Fletcher Merkel, 8, and Harper Moyski, 10, were killed in the shooting. Fifteen other children, ages 6 to 15, were injured, as were three parishioners in their 80s. All are expected to survive.
Amid the chaos, he said, Pedro tried to help and then searched frantically for his kids, Pilar and Pablo.
“I was yelling after them for a while, until I started screaming Spanish, their name and ‘where are you?’ in Spanish. And that’s where Pilar found me,” he said. “She came to me crying, and she told me, ‘I cannot find Pablo.’ And then I call my wife to tell her I have Pili, but I cannot find Pablo. And it was a terrible moment.”
Pilar, 7, recalled reuniting with her dad.
“It felt really good, because when the gunshots were over, I was like, ‘Where’s my mom and where’s my dad?’” she said. “I need them, because gunshots are really intense for just a 7-year-old.”
Pablo, 11, recalled the moment gunfire broke out while he was at Mass.
He said he was ducking and kneeling when the gunshots went off but did not think he was in a safe spot, so he took cover under a pew.
Pablo said he evacuated to a nearby preschool room, where he remembers seeing people “falling down the stairs” as they escaped. Teachers barricaded the door to protect the students and called 911, he said.
More than 100 rifle rounds were recovered from the scene, according to Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O’Hara.
The shooter died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, police said. Authorities have not identified a clear motive, but O’Hara said the suspect intended to terrorize children.
Carla and Pedro are struggling to explain the horrific events to their kids and have a hard time comprehending what happened themselves.
“Time just doesn’t make sense right now, so we’re just literally taking things one hour at a time,” Carla said.
