Nashville Students Hid in Woods During Covenant School Shooting

Students reportedly attempted to hide in a nearby forest during the mass shooting at Covenant Presbyterian School, according to one local reporter.

At least three students and three adult faculty members at the religious school were killed on Monday morning when a 28-year-old woman, believed to be a former student, entered the building with assault rifles and a handgun and opened fire. The identity of the shooter, who was shot and killed by police responding to the scene has not been disclosed at this time. According to data from the Gun Violence Archive (GVA), this was the 129th mass shooting in the U.S. in 2023. While there is no agreed definition, the GVA says a mass shooting is four or more people shot or killed in an incident, excluding the shooter.

As the day has progressed, further details about the shooting have trickled out via local media reports. Speaking on a live broadcast hours after the incident at Covenant School, local reporter Lydia Fielder with WSMV News reported that some students fleeing the violence attempted to hide in the woods nearby to the school.

Fielder had been able to enter a reunification center set up to allow parents to find their children and heard the claims from a church elder working there. They said that some children had come to the center covered in scratches they had gotten from thorns after jumping into bushes and while running among the trees.

Another WSMV report from Monday detailed further methods students used to hide during the chaotic shooting. Avery Myrick, the daughter of a pre-K teacher who has worked at Covenant for nearly 10 years, said that her mother had hidden in a closet with her students and that the shooter might have tried to get into her classroom.

"She said they were hiding in the closet, and there was shooting all over," Myrick said. "[She said] they had potentially tried to get into her room."

Speaking with the press, Nashville police chief John Drake said that the shooter entered Covenant School through a side entrance and made her way from the ground floor to the second, firing multiple shots as she went. She was ultimately subdued in a standoff with two of the five police officers that had entered the building. The only injury reported from the shooting was an officer who was cut by broken glass while attempting to engage the shooter.

Drake's address to the media also indicated that the school did have active shooter protocols that were put in place and that fleeing into the nearby woods might have been part of it.

The shooting is currently being examined by the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation. A vehicle believed to be connected to the shooter was found near the scene and may have helped give clues about her identity.

The victims were: Evelyn Dieckhaus, Hallie Scruggs and William Kinney, who were all 9 years old; Cynthia Peak, aged 61; Katherine Koonce, aged 60; and Mike Hill, aged 61, according to The Guardian.

Newsweek reached out to the Nashville Police Department via email for comment.