www.shelbystar.com The Star Tuesday, April 16, 2013 | 3ALocal / Nation20

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Virginia Tech shooting

anniversary

I f you’ve ever ridden a rollercoaster, or even driven over a steep hill,

you’ve probably experienced the “sinking feeling.” While in a state of free-fall, our bod-ies are essentially weightless,

so our stomachs feel very light, like they’re floating, or sometimes pushing, their way into our throats. I’ve expe-rienced

the sinking feeling countless times, but gravity isn’t always the explanation.

Six years ago today, the sinking feeling enveloped not only my stomach, but my heart. My roommate and I made it about 100 feet out-side our door before a friend told us to go back inside.

“There’s a gun-man on campus.”

For the remainder of the day, we sat in our shared Virginia Tech dorm room, eyes glued to the local news on our small television. Each time the number at the bot-tom of the screen went up, my heart sank a little more.

32.My heart stopped when

the counting stopped. I felt numb as I watched and re-watched footage of S.W.A.T. teams swarm-ing our campus, students jumping out of windows, and the injured being hurriedly carried away from the building. My friends’ faces mirrored the shock and painful sense of loss that I felt. As much as it hurt me to see them in so much pain, I remember how grateful I was to still have them by my side in that moment.

It’s strange how so many images from that day are seared into my memory, but the following weeks are such a blur.

“Surreal” only begins to describe how it feels to have your home-away-from-home crawling with medical vehicles, law enforcement officials, and local, national, even international media professionals. The wailing of emergency sirens echoed

in my ears for weeks, and it took months for me to be able to hear them without immediately experiencing the now very familiar “sinking feeling.”

It’s easy to assume that, after such a tragedy, students might be scared to be on campus. I can’t speak for everyone, but that was not the case for me at all. Once the campus was secure, I did leave for home, but it wasn’t because I was afraid to be there. The first thing I needed to do was be with my family, and I know that’s what they needed as well. We all needed the comfort and security that comes from being together, grateful and humbled at the thought that our family could have been one less person that day.

When I returned to the campus I had come to love, I didn’t love it any less for the tragedy that had taken place there. Just as one mistake should not define a person’s entire life, one event should not forever define the place where it occurred. More than anything, I will always remember the way we all came together, Hokies or not, to mourn the loss of our friends, and to try to find a way to honor and remember them. The love and kindness shown by so many is some-thing that helped restore my faith in humanity when I was afraid I had none left.

I believe in silver linings – that no matter how terrible something is, something good can ultimately come from it. It’s difficult to find the good when the bad is eating away at you, and all you are left with is an empty “sinking feeling.” But regardless of how anx-ious or uncomfortable that “sinking feeling” makes me, I will cling to it. Even when it hurts, it is a reminder that I am still here - a reminder that at any moment, any one of us could be taken from this world. As painful as it can be at times, I am alive. And I will live my life to the fullest, holding on to every precious moment, because that is the best way to honor those we have lost.

Reach Katie Gilbert at 704-669-3357 or kgil-bert@shelbystar.com.

Silver linings in sinking feelings

KATIEGILBERT

KM police searching for armed robbersFrom staff reports

Two armed men kicked in the door of a Kings Mountain home, demanded money from the residents and fired several shots inside the house before leaving, according to the Kings Mountain Police Department.

Officers responded to a call of a suspicious person at a home on the 700 block of

Katherine Avenue about 1:30 a.m. Saturday, according to Kings Mountain Police.

When the officer arrived at the house, the officer discov-ered the door kicked in and three people inside who said two men came in, demanded money and shot a gun at one of the people.

Detective Cpl. K.L. Hamrick said there were several shots fired inside, but no one was

injured.Hamrick said the victims

did not know the two men and the case is still under investigation.

Kings Mountain Police are asking anyone who has infor-mation on the incident to call Hamrick at 704-734-0444.

The first suspect is described as a black man, between 6 feet and 6-foot-2, with a slender built and wearing a black, full

face clown mask and all black clothing. Police said he was armed with a silver and gray semi-automatic pistol, pos-sibly a Ruger P89 9 mm.

The second man is de-scribed as a 6-foot-1 to 6-foot-3 black man. He has a slender built, short hair and was wearing a black strap around his face, a black coat and was armed with a black semi-auto-matic pistol.

Associated Press

Multiple memorials and ceremonies in Blacksburg, Va., and across the nation are honoring those killed in the April 16, 2007, shootings at Virginia Tech.

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‘A tremendous responsibility’Jeanie GrohStar intern

A longtime Shelby High as-sistant principal and Golden Lion graduate will become the school’s top administrator in

July.David Al-

len, who has worked at Shelby High School since 1995 in a va-riety of roles, will be the school’s next

principal.“I am tickled to death, but

I am scared to death. It is a tremendous responsibility,” Allen said.

Jennifer Walker, the current principal at Shelby High, will assume the role of Cleveland County Schools director of per-sonnel services this summer.

“I know I have a tremen-dous legacy here are Shelby High School to live up to,” Al-len said. “I’m going to do my best to do that.”

At Shelby High, Allen has served as an English teacher, yearbook advisor, driver’s education instructor and ten-nis coach. Most recently, he

served as an assistant principal for the last 10 years.

Allen, a native of Shelby, graduated from Shelby High School in 1986. He received his bachelor’s degree in jour-nalism from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1993 and his bachelor’s degree in English from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte in 1994. He received his master’s degree in School Administration from Gardner-Webb University in 2000.

“My goal for Shelby High School is to be the absolute best high school anywhere,”

Allen said. “I want people to be proud of Shelby High School as the high school in Shelby and we’re going to work hard in every aspect to make sure we do that.”

Allen is married to Amy Al-len, who is the assistant prin-cipal at Shelby Intermediate School. They have three chil-dren, David Jr., Michael and Katie. Both David and Michael will attend Shelby High next year. Allen’s parents, A. Don-ald and Hazel Allen still live in the Shelby area.

Reach Jeanie Groh at 704-669-3333.

Shelby High grad, assistant administrator to take over as principal

Allen

3 dead, 130 injured as blasts rock Boston Marathon

BOSTON (AP) — Two bombs exploded in the crowd-ed streets near the finish line of the Boston Marathon on Monday, killing at least three people and injuring more than 130 in a bloody scene of shat-tered glass and severed limbs that raised alarms that terror-ists might have struck again in the U.S.

A White House official speaking on condition of ano-nymity because the investiga-tion was still unfolding said the attack was being treated as an act of terrorism.

President Barack Obama vowed that those respon-sible will “feel the full weight of justice.”

As many as two unexploded bombs were also found near the end of the 26.2-mile course as part of what appeared to be a well-coordinated attack, but they were safely disarmed, according to a senior U.S. intel-ligence official, who also spoke on condition of anonym-ity because of the continuing investigation.

The fiery twin blasts took place about 10 seconds and about 100 yards apart, knock-ing spectators and at least one runner off their feet, shattering windows and sending dense plumes of smoke rising over the street and through the fluttering national flags lining the course. Blood stained the pavement, and huge shards were missing from window panes as high as three stories.

“Somebody’s leg flew by my head,” said a spectator who gave his name as John Ross. “I gave my belt to stop the blood.”

People were yelling, “I need my kids!”

“They just started bringing people in with no limbs,” said runner Tim Davey of Rich-mond, Va. He said he and his wife, Lisa, tried to keep their children’s eyes shielded from the gruesome scene inside a medical tent that had been set up to care for fatigued runners, but “they saw a lot.”

“They just kept filling up with more and more casual-ties,” Lisa Davey said. “Most everybody was conscious. They were very dazed.”

Authorities shed no light on a motive or who may have carried out the bombings, and police said they had no

suspects in custody. Authori-ties in Washington said there was no immediate claim of responsibility. The FBI took charge of the investigation.

Police said three people were killed. Hospitals reported at least 134 injured, at least 15 of them critically. The victims’ injuries included broken bones, shrapnel wounds and ruptured eardrums.

At Massachusetts General Hospital, Alisdair Conn, chief of emergency services, said: “This is something I’ve never seen in my 25 years here ... this amount of carnage in the civil-ian population. This is what we expect from war.”

Some 23,000 runners took part in the race, one of the world’s oldest and most pres-tigious marathons.

One of Boston’s biggest an-nual events, the race winds up

near Copley Square, not far from the landmark Prudential Center and the Boston Public Library. It is held on Patriots Day, which commemorates the first battles of the American Revolution, at Concord and Lexington in 1775.

Boston Police Commissioner Edward Davis asked people to stay indoors or go back to their hotel rooms and avoid crowds as bomb squads methodically checked parcels and bags left along the race route. He said in-vestigators didn’t know whether the bombs were hidden in mail-boxes or trash cans.

He said authorities had re-ceived “no specific intelligence that anything was going to happen” at the race.

The Federal Aviation Ad-ministration barred low-flying aircraft within 3.5 miles of the site.

“We still don’t know who did this or why,” Obama said at the White House, adding, “Make no mistake: We will get to the bottom of this.”

With scant official informa-tion to guide them, members of Congress said there was little or no doubt it was an act of terrorism.

Associated Press

People react to an explosion at the 2013 Boston Marathon in Boston on Monday. Two explosions shattered the euphoria of the Boston Marathon finish line on Monday, killing three people, including an 8-year-old boy, and injuring at least 130 people.

“

”

Somebody’s leg fl ew by my head. I gave my belt to stop the blood.

John RossBoston Marathon spectator who witnessed explosions

SOURCE: ESRI AP

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Two explosions at Boston Marathonfinish line