That morning, a warning had been delivered by phone to Apalachee High School: there would be shootings at five schools on Wednesday.
The anonymous caller—later confirmed by law enforcement—warned that Apalachee would be the first target. Still, students across Winder, Georgia, filed into their classes that day, attending first period, then second.
For Lyela Sayarath at Apalachee High, the second period was Algebra 1.
During the lesson, the quiet boy seated beside her stood up and left the room, the door closing and locking automatically behind him. Lyela didn’t think much of it—he was known for skipping class.
But then, he came back.
The 14-year-old knocked on the door, and a girl got up to let him in. She jumped back, startled.
The boy was holding an assault rifle.
From the small window in the locked classroom door, Lyela saw the boy with the gun turned toward another room, she later recalled.
Moments later, gunshots echoed through Apalachee High School.
At Haymon-Morris Middle School, just a 10-minute walk away, eighth-grader Tim Mosher was also in the second period—Connections B: band—when he heard a gunshot.
The 13-year-old percussionist grabbed a large drum, preparing to throw it at the shooter.
But then, an announcement came: the school was on lockdown.
Tim sat down, his back against the wall, as someone turned off the lights. The room was silent.
Like so many students across America, they had practiced for this moment. They knew to stay quiet. What they didn’t yet know was that their town of Winder, Georgia, was on the verge of becoming the site of the deadliest school shooting in the U.S. this year.
At that same time, Tim’s mother, Pam Mosher, was in a Publix supermarket down the road. Her phone buzzed with a message from her son’s school:
“Parents, at this time we are exercising caution. The school is in a hard lockdown due to our neighboring school—Apalachee—also being in lockdown. HMMS students are safe. Please do not attempt to come to the school at this time.”
Moments later, police cars sped past, sirens blaring, heading toward the shared school campus.
Pam Mosher knew something was terribly wrong.
In Lyela’s algebra class, students dropped to the floor and crawled to a corner, huddling together as the teacher quickly turned off the lights.
Sixteen-year-old Lyela pushed desks in front of herself and her classmates, urging them to stay low.
Elsewhere at Apalachee High, Ethan Haney heard what sounded like nine gunshots just outside his classroom. He immediately shut the door, as he would later recount to his mom. The 17-year-old and his classmates hurriedly pulled chairs and tables to barricade it.
Like many students taking cover at that moment, Ethan’s thoughts went to his loved ones. His fingers reached for his phone.
‘No matter what you do, keep texting me’
The sound of gunshots echoing through the high school hallways struck 16-year-old Julie Sandoval as if heavy books were being slammed down.
For Janice Martinez, it sounded like someone playing around outside.
But within seconds, that illusion shattered. Her teacher was trembling, and her classmates were in tears.
“The noise kept getting louder and louder,” Janice recalled. “I told everyone to get down. Get down.”
Julie didn’t know what else to do but hide and text her parents, anxious about her younger sister, who also attended the high school. Through sobs, she told her parents how much she loved them and apologized for not being “the perfect daughter.”
Macey Right, 14, sent a message to her mother as well: “Mom, I’m scared. I hear gunshots. Please come get me.”
She also heard screams—people pleading not to be shot—and others around her, shaking and crying.
Her mother, Anetra Pattman, a teacher at a nearby alternative school about five miles from Apalachee High, tried to comfort her daughter from a distance.
“No matter what happens, keep texting me—just text me, just text me—so I know you’re OK,” Pattman recalled messaging her child as her own school went into lockdown. Pattman turned off her classroom lights and kept her students silent.
Shana McMillan received horrifying messages from her daughter, who was hiding in a room across from a classroom where a teacher had been killed. Her daughter’s teacher had instructed the students to huddle in a corner and then stood over them to “protect them in case the shooter came in.”
Soon, students from the classroom across the hall rushed into her daughter’s room, crying. “She was terrified,” McMillan said. “She thought the shooter might come to their classroom next.”
Macey and the other girls held hands and prayed. Moments later, the room was disrupted by banging and shouting.
A classmate told Macey that one of her friends had been shot in the shoulder.
Authorities received the first reports of an active shooter at 10:20 a.m., triggered by a wearable panic button issued just a week earlier to teachers, according to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation director and the Barrow County sheriff.
Within minutes, school resource officers confronted the shooter. The suspect, a 14-year-old boy, surrendered and was taken into custody, officials said.
Outside the school, the wait for answers was agonizing.
Pam Mosher left the grocery store and went home, receiving texts from the school.
11:38 a.m.: “Haymon-Morris Midd: Parents and Guardians, HMMS is still on a hard lockdown. HMMS students are safe and secure. Please be patient.”
Meanwhile, news began to spread—via text chains, Atlanta news stations, and CNN—that four people had been shot and killed at Apalachee High.
Mosher tried to remain patient, trusting in her community and the system.
“We’re in Barrow County,” she would later say. “I know what’s in those cop cars. I know they train for this.”
Kathrine Maldonado woke up late that Wednesday to texts from a friend. While Kathrine had overslept, their school had gone into lockdown.
Her friend reassured her that she was safe, and then started messaging group chats.
Together, they learned that a friend had been killed.
“I started crying,” Kathrine said, “and then I just got angry.”
Keep your head up, keep your head up
With the suspect in custody, officers flooded into Apalachee High, evacuating students from classrooms as paramedics treated the wounded. Helicopters hovered overhead.
By then, the gravity of the situation was clear: two teachers and two 14-year-old students were dead, and nine others—eight students and one teacher—were injured and transported to hospitals, according to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.
Julie Sandoval cried when she heard the police enter her classroom.
“Let me see your hands!” they shouted.
“I started bawling because my initial reaction was fear—I had a gun pointed at me. But then I realized, ‘OK, this means I’m safe now. The police are here, and I’ll be fine,’” Julie said.
Students walked through the school hallways with their arms raised as officers directed them: “Keep your head up, keep your head up.”
I finally reached her, and she was devastated
For hours, Tim Mosher sat against the wall in his band class, not watching the clock. At some point, snacks and drinks were brought to the students waiting in Connections B.
Tim received a Lucky Charms snack bar and a small carton of milk, cafeteria-style.
By mid-afternoon, Pam Mosher received another text:
“Haymon-Morris Midd: Law enforcement has now given the OK to lift the lockdown … Thank you.”
So, Pam headed toward Haymon-Morris Middle School.
By then, hundreds—perhaps thousands—of others were converging on the campus. The roads leading to the school were clogged with parents, grandparents, neighbors, and friends of the children from Winder, their vehicles creating a long line of brake lights stretching over the horizon.
Pam joined the crowd of people who had parked their cars in long rows on sidewalks and roadway shoulders and walked—pushing strollers, maneuvering leg-cast scooters, and carrying toddlers—toward the flashing blue lights.
Along the way, neighbors had set up a card table and were distributing water, sports drinks, granola bars, applesauce packs, cheese and peanut butter crackers, gummies, and cold, cubed watermelon.
“It’s afternoon, and many of the students haven’t eaten since breakfast,” said organizer Chris Comfort.
“There were some kids who hadn’t eaten since last night because they didn’t have time for breakfast this morning,” added her daughter, Geaux, who is homeschooled. “It’s hot, and it’s scary. I hated that my friends and even kids I don’t know have to go through this.”
As families scrambled to reunite outside the school, Lyela spoke with a CNN reporter about the shooting. She described seeing a friend who had been in a classroom where shots were fired.
“He saw it. He saw somebody get shot. He had blood on him and was kind of limping,” Lyela said. “He looked horrified.”
Meanwhile, Macey and her mom were reunited in a tearful embrace.
“I finally found her, and she was devastated. We hugged and cried for a while,” Pattman said. “You never, ever think it could happen to you or to one of your children.”
Erin Clark, who had been sending loving texts to her “baby,” found Ethan safe by the bleachers.
When Pam Mosher finally arrived at Tim’s school, police, sheriff’s deputies, and SWAT officers had blocked every entrance, she said.
Mosher presented her ID, and Tim confirmed that she was his mother.
Mother and son then began the long walk home.
Here’s the latest update on the shooting at Apalachee High School in Georgia
