A 16-year-old boy has killed a teacher and three children in a shooting at an elementary school in Oregon, United States, before being fatally shot by an armed community member who pursued him into the building.
Police confirmed the incident on Thursday, October 15, 2026, following reports of a gunman at Silver Rail Elementary School in Bend, a city of about 100,000 people in the northwestern United States.
Bend Police Chief Mike Krantz said the three children killed at the scene were aged five, eight and 11.
Another child and a teacher sustained critical injuries and were receiving medical treatment, he added.
According to Krantz, police initially received a report from a person who said they had been shot at several times by an individual carrying a long gun.
Dozens of emergency calls subsequently reported that the gunman had entered the school, prompting law enforcement officers across the area to respond to the scene.
Krantz said an officer later reported that a community member had confronted the suspect after seeing him enter the school.
“Moments later, an officer reported that the suspect had been shot by a community member who had seen the suspect enter the school and pursued him into the school and engaged him,” the police chief said.
He added that responding officers subsequently entered the building and confirmed that the suspect was dead.
Residents gathered at Drake Park in Bend on Thursday evening for a candlelight vigil to honour the victims and mourn those killed in the attack.
The shooting has renewed concerns about gun violence in the United States, where firearms are widely available and mass shootings have repeatedly claimed the lives of children, teachers and other members of the public.
The country records thousands of firearm-related deaths annually and has a higher rate of gun deaths than other wealthy, developed nations.
