The first call to Deschutes County dispatchers came in at 12:59 p.m. from someone in a vehicle outside Silver Rail Elementary School. Someone was shooting at them with a long gun in the parking lot of a Bend grade school, they said.

Then more calls, dozens of them: A shooter had entered the building at the school, Police Chief Mike Krantz recounted at a press conference Thursday, just hours later.

At 1 p.m., a minute after the initial call, the alert went out to all law enforcement in the area. Within another minute, the school was in lockdown.

Erin Johnson was in the house next door when she heard it all unfold: gunfire, where usually she hears children play. “Three shots and then two shots.” A familiar sound from her time in the military — but here in Bend, at the neighborhood school her children used to attend. “Then my neighbor began to scream,” she said, and she heard sirens.

At 1:02 p.m., the first officers arrived on the scene. But someone else had responded first, before the first responders, Krantz said.

“A community member who had seen the suspect” entering the school followed him, Krantz said, and shot the 16-year-old boy. Three children — ages 5, 8, 11 — died in the shooting, and so did a teacher. A 7-year-old and a 54-year-old teacher were critically hurt and taken to St. Charles Medical Center in Bend.

Silver Rail Elementary is in a quiet residential neighborhood on the east side of Bend surrounded by new houses, large open spaces and the omnipresent juniper trees. On a normal day, kids ride their bikes through these areas.

But Thursday afternoon, the school was cordoned off with yellow tape. For hours, officers moved from classroom to classroom, escorting children to buses to be taken to their families. Other officers walked shoulder to shoulder in a line outside the school, searching for evidence on the campus grounds.

Word of the shooting spread quickly through Bend, a city of about 100,000, as police started their sweep of Silver Rail.

Within an hour of the shooting, hundreds of parents and community members were flocking to Journey Church — the designated “reunification center” for children bussed away from Silver Rail. There, they were met by more police, more yellow tape as officers managed access — helping family members park as they sought updates about their children.

By evening, the people of Bend came together to mourn.

A dozen local clergy members were among the first to arrive at Drake Park’s amphitheater, circling together for prayer.

Then more people arrived. Individuals, families, friends, strangers, adults and children.

Adam Jorgensen attended with two friends.

“We’re here doing the Lord’s work, being here for people who need hope and need understanding of why tragedies like this happen,” Jorgensen said. “The entire city of Bend is here together.”

Hundreds of people filled the park as the sky fell into darkness. They held candles and huddled together, filling the air with hymns and prayers — a tight knit community, gathering together to mourn.

Kevin Desrosiers, who was there with his two daughters, said he knew the grandparents and parents of the 5-year-old who died. He had attended a birthday party for the only child a couple years ago, he said.

“They’re a great local family, been here for years,” Desrosiers said, choking back tears, as clergy members spoke in the background.

“It’s super tough to know that it could have been your kid’s school or campus,” he said. “You never want to say goodbye to your kids in the morning and even assume that you wouldn’t see them again at the end of the school day.”

This story was reported by Emily Cureton Cook, Jireh Deng and Joni Auden Land in Bend, and written by Courtney Sherwood in Portland.

News Source : https://www.opb.org/article/2026/10/15/bend-reels-after-school-shooting/