School Shooting Calls Reveal Fear, Mayhem

Nov. 13--Her voice was frantic, at times halting, as she described the horror inside of Marysville-Pilchuck High School's cafeteria that morning last month.

Bodies of students lay strewn around her. Screams sometimes drowned out her own urgent words.

But somehow, teacher Megan Silberberger managed to relay the key details of a mass shooting to emergency officials, moments after a 15-year-old student opened fire on five of his classmates and then turned the gun on himself.

"I'm in the cafeteria; I have the shooter. One shooter," Silberberger desperately told a dispatcher during a 9-1-1 call. "Blood is everywhere. I do not see the gun. I have him down."

On Wednesday, Snohomish County law-enforcement officials released the audio of Silberberger's emergency phone call, along with recordings of 14 other 9-1-1 calls made after the Oct. 24 shooting.

The emergency calls to SNOPAC 9-1-1 dispatchers started coming in shortly after Jaylen Fryberg, a high-school freshman and Tulalip tribal member, arranged to meet several of his friends and relatives at a table in the school's cafeteria, then pulled out a gun and started shooting.

Four students -- Gia Soriano, Zoe Galasso and Shaylee Chuckulnaskit, all 14; and Andrew Fryberg, 15 -- suffered fatal gunshot wounds. A fifth student, Fryberg's cousin Nate Hatch, 14, survived a gunshot to his face. Jaylen Fryberg also died at the scene after shooting himself.

The 9-1-1 recordings released Wednesday illustrate the fear and mayhem that unfolded in real time in the shooting's aftermath, as students, parents, neighbors and school employees called out for help.

At times, the taped phone calls also captured the steady-handed professionalism demonstrated by both school officials and dispatchers amid the chaos.

None are more chilling than the one-minute, 47-second call from the cafeteria placed by Silberberger, 28, a first-year social-studies teacher who had just started at Marysville-Pilchuck this school year.

"Nine-one-one, we have a shooting," Silberberger reported at the start of the call. "Marysville-Pilchuck High School cafeteria. We have the shooter. We have many injured. Marysville-Pilchuck High School. We need emergency right away."

After a dispatcher calmly asked Silberberger to describe the shooter, the teacher replied: "I am looking at him. I need help. I need help now . ... Shooter, right here. He's wearing all black. I'm staring at him right now, sitting next to him."

"He is a high-school student," Silberberger added later. " I do not know who he is. I tried to stop him before he shot himself. I do not know his name. He shot himself. He shot -- many are down. I do not know how many are down."

Described by some as a hero for trying to thwart Fryberg's suicide attempt, Silberberger has declined to be interviewed since last month's shooting.

Recordings of several other 9-1-1 calls released Wednesday captured the raw emotion in students' voices during calls from the school moments after the shots erupted.

In one call, placed minutes after Fryberg's attack, food-services employee Anne Haughian -- at times sobbing with worry about her own daughter's whereabouts -- explained to a dispatcher how she "saw a boy come in" before the gunfire.

"I just left the cafeteria, guided students out the side door," she said.

Another woman, who lives just west of the school, called 9-1-1 to report that she was harboring several witnesses who had just fled the school's cafeteria.

"I have several students at my house right now and some of them saw the shooter; they saw it happen," she said. "They're inside my house. They crawled over my back fence to get away from the shooter."

Relaying information from the student witnesses, the woman identified the shooter as Fryberg and even spelled his name out for a dispatcher.

Also released Wednesday were recordings of communications between emergency dispatchers and Airlift Northwest, a regional helicopter medical-transport service.

SNOPAC released the recordings Wednesday by authority of the Snohomish County Multiple Agency Response Team -- a group of investigators from various Snohomish County law-enforcement agencies that is now investigating the shooting -- after The Seattle Times and other media submitted public-disclosure requests for the audio records.

Recordings of more than two dozen of the 43 emergency calls fielded within an hour of the shooting have yet to be released.

During one call released Wednesday, Sue Olson, who works in the high school's main office, talked with a dispatcher for nearly 10 minutes. Throughout the call, Olson is heard calming students and garnering information for emergency officials.

At one point, after asking someone how many ambulances are needed, Olson told the dispatcher: "Six kids. Oh, my God."

"I know it's upsetting," the dispatcher replied. "But you're doing a good job."

"I'm trying," Olson said.

Lewis Kamb: 206-464-2932 or lkamb@seattletimes.com On Twitter @lewiskamb

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