Two people were killed Thursday afternoon at a health building at the University of South Carolina in what turned out to be a murder-suicide, officials said.
For nearly an hour, in an alert, school officials told students to seek safe shelter and obey officials after the incident at the new Public Health building.
At 2:15 pm — an hour after the first alert — school officials said “there is no longer an existing threat on campus.”
South Carolina Law Enforcement officials said that 2 people were dead, but would not say if students were killed.
The shooting was reported at the Arnold School of Public Health at 921 Assembly Street, officials said.
“Every indication we have seen so far it appears to be a very isolated incident – a murder-suicide,” said Thom Berry of SLED.
“The building remains closed at this time. All surrounding streets are closed,” officials said in an alert.
Park and College Streets were closed and students were told to avoid the area.
Student Hayden Dunn, a senior from Myrtle Beach, said he was in the health building about 1 p.m., getting in an elevator to change classes, when a police officer also got inside.
Dunn said the officer asked whether anyone had heard gunshots, but they hadn’t. Dunn said he went to class, then an alarm sounded five minutes later, and people rushed outside. Another officer told him shots had been fired, he said.
“Otherwise, you wouldn’t have known anything happened,” Dunn said.
