At least 10 people have been killed and more seriously injured in a shooting at a secondary school in the southern Austrian city of Graz, authorities have said.
The mayor of Graz, Elke Kahr, said the presumed shooter and several students were among the fatalities in the attack, the deadliest in Austria’s postwar history.
Local media reported the attack began at about 10am local time when a gunman opened fire in two classrooms. Ninety minutes later local police said on social media they believed there was “no further danger” after a major security operation involving a special forces unit and several police helicopters.
Pupils and staff were evacuated from the BORG Dreierschützengasse high school in Graz, and the building was being thoroughly searched, a police spokesperson said, confirming “several fatalities” but giving no specific number.
Police sources told the Kurier newspaper the perpetrator appeared to have been a former student at the school who turned his weapon on himself. Families were gathering at a nearby sports hall and crisis intervention teams were on hand.
The area around the school was cordoned off and public transport was diverted, with all streets surrounding the school guarded by armed officers. Emergency vehicles were continuing to head to the school at midday, reporters at the scene said.
Austria’s interior minister, Gerhard Karner, and chancellor, Christian Stocker, were on their way to Graz. Kahr, the mayor, described the shooting as a “terrible tragedy”, adding that the killings “concern us all … Time will be needed to process this.”
The Vienna mayor, Michael Ludwig, posted on social media: “we must stand together as a society. Hate and violence must never gain the upper hand. Our response to this must be an even stronger commitment to solidarity and respect.”
The country’s foreign minister, Beate Meinl-Reisinger, said her “sympathy and sadness are with the victims and their families”. The news of the shooting was “incomprehensible and unbearable”, she said. “No one can imagine the suffering.”