As the pieces of the puzzle are falling into place on what happened at Virginia Tech on Monday morning, some Restonians with connections to the school are offering their views on the tragic events in Blacksburg.
When Nik Morse, 22, learned of the tragic events at Virginia Tech, he was told a friend of his had been shot in the leg. "Fortunately that turned out to be a rumor," said Morse, who grew up in Reston and graduated from Paul VI in Fairfax in 2003. Morse currently attends college in Fresno, California. He said most of his graduating class went to Virginia Tech, and by Tuesday morning he had not heard from all of his friends.
"Everybody knows somebody who goes to Tech," said Claudia Thompson-Deahl, the environmental resource manager at Reston Association. Her daughter Lauren Deahl is a junior, pre-vet student, at Virginia Tech. She was in her apartment off campus when the shootings happened, but drove to pick her roommates up from the campus after the mayhem.
Thompson-Deahl said she had a hard time contacting her daughter on Monday, because the phone lines were jammed. However, she did receive an e-mail that her daughter was safe after picking up her roommates. According to Thompson-Deahl, Lauren and her roommates were clearly upset with the events. "How could this happen, how can people be so mean," they asked.
"THIS IS AN INCREDIBALLY shocking event and it leaves you speechless," said Mike Clarke, president and CEO of Access National Bank and a 1983 Virginia Tech graduate. He is an active member of the Virginia Tech Alumni Association. Clarke said Access actively recruits from universities, and there are more than 15 Virginia Tech alumni working at Access. "One of the associates knew two of the students who were killed," said Clarke.
Virginia Tech is an extension of the Northern Virginia community, according to Clarke. He said students from this area constitute the dominant student population at the university, and Monday’s tragic event would certainly have impact on the local community. Clarke said that he always felt safe at Virginia Tech, a haven for 26,000 students nestled in the state’s country side. "It feels like a very safe environment," he said. The types of crime that occurred there when he attended the university were just typical college pranks, he said.
"YOU THINK OF a college as a place to be safe," said Thompson-Deahl. She visited the campus for Easter weekend, and said she felt safe in a beautiful environment. After the horror that swept through the campus on Monday, Thompson-Deahl thinks the beauty of the college may be compromised with metal detectors at building entrances and new security measures.
She does not hold the university’s administration at fault for not preventing the massacre. "I can’t blame anybody. Who could expect this?" she said.
Others are somewhat upset about the fact that the shooting incidents happened two hours apart. Todd Wilcox attended Virginia Tech from 1991 to 1993, and said he was upset with the authorities. "How someone could shoot somebody and two hours later shoot elsewhere, [that] kind of got me angry," said Wilcox, a long time Reston resident who graduated from South Lakes High School. He remembers the campus and the surrounding areas as a quiet place.
Wilcox said he learned about the events at a stage when it was too early to know all of the details. Even when it was reported that one person had been killed, Wilcox was shocked. "I couldn’t figure out why something like that would happen at Virginia Tech," said Wilcox, who was in the engineering program when he attended the university. He attended many classes in Norris Hall, where 31 people, including the gunman, were killed. "I could see it being stress related on the student’s part," said Wilcox.
"I’m feeling very sad," said Thompson-Deahl. "My heart goes out to all of the victims’ families."
Clarke said he was encouraged when he saw students interviewed on television say they would not leave the campus. "Why would I leave, I love this place, it’s a part of me," he said he heard the students say to the reporters.