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At Least One Killed, Others Injured in Naval Air Station Pensacola Shooting. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired December 06, 2019 - 09:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[09:00:00]

REAR ADM. JOHN KIRBY, CNN MILITARY AND DIPLOMATIC ANALYST (via phone): -- who just love the military, they love this country, and they really love the Navy. The Blue Angels fly at Pensacola. That's why I lived there for five years. I was with the Blue Angels for a few years and they of course are international celebrities, the Blue Angels flight team. And the Pensacola people, they just love the Blues and they love the Navy. They love the base there.

And there's a terrific relationship. And there has been for as long as I can remember. This great relationship between the people of Pensacola and the Navy at a base there. Civic leadership there. It's a terrific Navy town. And if you are a sailor, it's one of the places you want to be stationed because it's so friendly to the Navy, because it's so easy to live there and because the people so very much appreciate you.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: All right. Admiral Kirby, stand by if you will.

CNN's breaking news coverage of this shooting at a naval air base in Pensacola continues now with Poppy Harlow and Jim Sciutto.

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN Breaking News.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: All right. We do begin with breaking news this morning. I'm Poppy Harlow in New York.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Jim Sciutto following breaking news out of Pensacola, Florida.

There was an active shooter on the Pensacola Naval Air Station. We're learning now that the shooter is now dead. Our latest numbers, five injured. Patients taken to local hospitals. There is no word yet on their condition. The base remains on lockdown.

HARLOW: Let's get straight to our Victor Blackwell. He has been making calls to authorities finding out what he can.

Victor, do we know if there are any fatalities at this point?

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR AND CORRESPONDENT: So we do not have that other than the death of this now former active shooter. I'll tell you what we know and what we don't know. As Jim just said that the shooter is dead. We do not know if that was the result of shooting with deputies or others or if that was a self-inflicted wound.

Those five people taken to Baptist Health. We do not know the extent of their injuries. We're also not aware if that is the totality of those injured. That's just the number from that one facility. But this facility, the NAS Pensacola, this is the far western panhandle of Florida, is currently on lockdown. We know from their Web site, from their Twitter account rather, that NAS Pensacola, both gates accessing that facility, those are secured. Those are locked down.

And we just learned from the ATF that there is a search of buildings on that facility happening right now to find out if there are others who were injured. If there are any fatalities or if there are other shooters as part of this. But more about this facility. 16,000 military employees. 7400 civilians.

Those who have been with us for a couple of minutes now just heard from Admiral Kirby just how expansive this is. But we know again the shooter is dead. At least five injured have been taken to Baptist Health. We're still waiting to get the extent of those injuries and if there are more who were injured -- Jim, Poppy.

SCIUTTO: This is, of course, the second shooting at a military installation just in the last two days. On Wednesday, there was a fatal shooting at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii.

We have Barbara Starr. She's at the Pentagon with us.

Barbara, tell us what you're hearing from military and also what are the rules? What are the regulations for bringing a firearm onto a military installation like this?

BARBARA STARR, CNN PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: You know, Jim, Poppy, you would think that this would be very heavily restricted, that anyone could bring a weapon aboard a military base in this country. Actually, the Pentagon has struggled with this issue for the last several years. And in 2016, the rules were loosened a bit to allow people to bring personnel firearms on board bases with some restrictions with going through some paperwork, getting commanders' approval, that sort of thing.

They've struggled with this since the Ft. Hood shooting in 2009 where a gunman killed 13 people then again in 2015 another gunman killed four Marines at an installation -- two installations in Tennessee. The military has not been anxious to have any loosening of the policy. In fact, the Army has very strongly argued against it. And what they don't want is -- and there's been discussion about it. Should people just be armed? Is that a better way for them to defend themselves?

The military obviously very opposed to that. I think now having two shootings in just a couple of days on board military installations is probably going to bring the issue back and perhaps have them take another look at it. Even if they completely restricted it, as you've been pointing out, these are massive bases. Tens of thousands of people. You can't search all cars. You can't search everybody coming onto the base. So it's really a very tough issue. If somebody wants to get a gun in, the chances are they're going to figure out a way to do it.

SCIUTTO: It's a sad fact.

HARLOW: Yes. Barbara Starr, thank you very much. Stay close. We do have some very sad news to bring everyone.

[09:05:02]

We have just learned in the past few moments that there is one additional fatality. Again, this previously active shooter dead, but now we know that someone else is dead, has been shot and killed in this incident.

Let's bring in our guests. Let me go first to Rear Admiral John Kirby.

Admiral Kirby, you spent five years here at this naval installation. The news that at least one person has been killed in all of this.

KIRBY: And that's heartbreaking. I mean, I still have friends down there. My mother-in-law lives just not far from the back gate of the base. I mean, it's home to us. This is where me and my kids went for vacations after we left Pensacola. And I can tell you, it's not going to be just heartbreaking for the people that live and work on the base but it'll be heartbreaking to the city of Pensacola which has really wrapped its arms around the Navy and that base in particular.

So it's just devastating news. And I just -- my thoughts and prayers go out. Everybody says that, but I really do mean that for everybody there in Pensacola who I know is suffering right now.

SCIUTTO: John, Admiral Kirby, second shooting, fatal shooting on a military installation just in 72 hours.

HARLOW: Yes.

SCIUTTO: We had the one on Wednesday at Pearl Harbor. Tell me -- and, of course, Barbara mentioned past shootings, the most deadly being that at Ft. Hood a number of years ago. Tell me how the military responds to this sort of thing, one, and, two, what's their level of concern? Because, of course, mass shootings have become a fact of life in America and a whole host of locations ss and the military certainly not excluded.

KIRBY: So, unfortunately, and Barbara did great reporting there, reminding us all about Ft. Hood. But unfortunately in the last, you know, 10 years or so, this has become something that military authorities on bases here in the domestic United States have had to focus a fair bit of training and preparation for. So bases like Pensacola would normally have lockdown drills at some measure of frequency. Whatever measure they believe was appropriate.

They would view this on a routine basis so that they could do it efficiently when the time came. So I have no doubt that NAS Pensacola has been keeping up their protocols and their readiness in that regard. They did exactly the right thing, which is, you know, first just you lock it down then you make sure people know it's locked down. You make sure people on the base it's locked down. That they can't leave and they have various ways to do that. Electronically as well as face-to-face.

And then you make sure that the local media know it's on lockdown so that the people of Pensacola stay away and know they have to stay away from the base. Then you bring in local law enforcement. And from the press coverage I've seen it looks like they did exactly that. They brought in the Escambia County Sheriff's Office, that local medical assistance coming in, EMTs as well as perhaps the Pensacola City Police, which is exactly what you want to do to assist your efforts. Especially when it was a live situation.

The base security apparatus of Pensacola is sizable because of the geography of the base. It is a very big base. It stretches for miles. And there's more than 20,000 people that live and work there. Not to mention families. Lots of families live on base. We did when I was stationed there. So it's a sizable population which warrants a sizable security apparatus, yet you still want to have that local assistance as well. They did exactly that.

SCIUTTO: Yes. These bases are cities, really. But, you know, Poppy, as you hear about that there, protocol for a lockdown on a military base, for military bases to elementary schools, lockdowns.

HARLOW: That's exactly --

SCIUTTO: It's a part --

HARLOW: Yes.

SCIUTTO: It's a part of American life today as a result of shootings like we're seeing here.

HARLOW: You are so right, Jim, to describe this as a city because that's what it is. As Admiral Kirby said his whole family was there when he was stationed there for five years. He got kids there going to school like all your kids are going to school this Friday morning and this is what happened.

Shimon Prokupecz has reporting on this for us. He is with me here in New York.

What do you know?

SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN CRIME AND JUSTICE REPORTER: So as we've been reporting the shooter is dead. So it would seem that at least for now police there have -- they believe they have the situation under control. The key now for them is what we see in these situations time and time again is the local authorities to go through the building, through the area to make sure there's no other threat.

There was something going on there, some of the EMS workers got a little spooked I was told and they walked out of the building.

HARLOW: While they were trying to assist?

PROKUPECZ: While they were trying to assist. So, you know, this is the normal stuff.

HARLOW: Sure.

PROKUPECZ: People see things. They hear things. They pull out. They come back in. So everyone is still being cautious on scene. They don't have an exact number yet. At least you know the hospitals are reporting some of the injuries that they're receiving but the authorities there don't have an exact number on the number of injured. The fact that the shooter is, that is a sigh of relief for them because they now know, at least they believe they have it somewhat contained.

But obviously, they need to go through the entire area, go through the buildings. And a lot of this is falling on the sheriff's office, the local police there who are very familiar with this area. They train for this, obviously. So they are in there, they're going through it, and they need to figure out if there's anyone else that's been injured or possibly deceased.

[09:10:03]

HARLOW: Yes. And they don't know, Jim, the total. Shimon, thank you. Stay with us as you keep reporting.

Jim, they don't know the total number of injured. Right? One hospital has five patients right now. Others could be going to other hospitals. At least one additional fatality in all of this.

SCIUTTO: Yes. We have James Gagliano, long experience in the FBI.

What struck me here is what appears to be, James, a very quick response from the first report of an active shooter to that active shooter being dead. And again, we don't know the circumstances. It could have been a suicide. That often happens in this self-inflicted gunshot wound or it could have been law enforcement that reacted and took him down, took him or her down, the active shooter down. But one thing we have seen as active shooters have become more common in this country is that law enforcement, they know how to respond and to respond quickly.

JAMES GAGLIANO, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT ANALYST: Jim, not just that, but they work together in concert. There's a collaborative response now. And to your point, this was, again, another instance where law enforcement went to the sound of the guns.

I've lived on military bases. I've lived on military posts. I'm familiar with how it works when it comes to integration law enforcement. This is an issue that's going to have a number of different departments and jurisdictions dealing with it.

The FBI and the Naval Criminal Investigative Service will handle the investigative piece now that we believe the shooter is down and been neutralized. And they've also got military police working with Escambia County and all the locals there so it is a -- it's a combined operation.

And, look, Jim, security protocols on posts across the country and across the globe have changed. Post-9/11, 20 years ago, we worried about the threat from the outside coming in. And we basically buttressed our defenses. Post-2009 and obviously the Ft. Hood shooter, that was an insider threat. We don't know right now if that's what this was. This could have been a whole host of different things. Everything that law enforcement usually cycles through. Was it a domestic dispute, was it workplace violence? Was it terror? Was it a hate crime? Could it have been a disgruntled soldier or somebody on multiple deployments and came back?

And I think Admiral Kirby hit on it with the weapons accessibility. This is a naval base, which is different from an Army post. Army posts usually have infantry divisions stationed there so there's, you know, large, you know, weapons rooms with rifles and things like that. This was a place that trained Navy pilots but the soldiers or the sailors there are still allowed to have personally owned weapons.

They do have to be secured in arms rooms. So I imagine when we get to the bottom of this it's going to be an instance that somebody bringing a weapon that they shouldn't have had on base.

HARLOW: Right.

GAGLIANO: To effect this horrific, horrific incident.

HARLOW: OK. Let's take a look. We're getting some new pictures in as this horrible breaking story develops. These are the first images that I believe we're seeing outside of the hospital in Pensacola, Florida. These are live images. This is from our affiliate WEAR. You see paramedics, first responders, ER doctors and nurses it appears, waiting potentially, Jim, for more. Potentially for more of the injured to come.

SCIUTTO: Yes. That does look like they are on standby there for the possibility of more injured. And as you mentioned to our knowledge at this point, shooter dead. Another additional fatality. A total of five patients at the hospital there.

HARLOW: OK. We are on top of this. We will be right back with more.

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[09:15:00]

SCIUTTO: Bringing you the latest on what was an active shooter on Naval Air Station, Pensacola in Florida. We are told the shooter is now dead. But we've also learned of another fatality in this shooting as well as five injuries. Those now being treated at a local hospital.

It is not clear whether one of those listed as injured is now that fatality. But a total of five casualties it appears in this shooting at this point. You could see live pictures there outside a local hospital, as it appears that emergency medical services there waiting for the possibility, at least, of additional victims. Victor Blackwell, he's been following the latest from the scene. Victor, what is the latest we're hearing from law enforcement.

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: So, we just got this in during that break, Jim and Poppy. We now know that the FBI will be sending agents from the Pensacola office, the Jacksonville office and the Mobile, Alabama office as well as part of this investigation across this sprawling facility here, NAS Pensacola.

Let me bring everyone who is joining us up-to-date here as you watch the live pictures we're getting in from our affiliates. As Jim said, the shooter in this -- formerly active shooter situation is dead, in addition, one other person. We do not know the identities, as you would expect this early on in this type of situation.

And we also don't know if the death of that shooter was the result of gunfire from law enforcement or others or a self-inflicted gunshot wound. We know that NAS Pensacola with 16,000 military employees, 7,400 civilian employees, that facility is on lock-down right now.

We're getting that from the Navy. And we're also receiving from the spokesperson for Florida Governor Ron DeSantis that he is aware and monitoring this and getting updates from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement and offering state resources as well in this investigation.

[09:20:00]

Five people have been injured. That is according to Baptist Health. We should say that five people have been taken to Baptist Health facilities. The camera you saw with the paramedics and other health officials waiting outside, that was from Sacred Heart, another hospital there. They're waiting potentially for injured, we do not know the full extent of those injuries or if the five is the totality, but that's the latest we have on what happened this morning. This ongoing breaking news situation in the Florida Panhandle. Jim, Poppy?

HARLOW: Victor, thank you so much for staying on top of this. Bring us more as you get it. We have our experts here, including Rear Admiral John Kirby who lived on this base for five years. He is with us on the phone. And Admiral Kirby, let me just ask you this, because you lived there, you have this experience and you know how the Navy operates.

You now have two shootings, two fatal shootings on two Naval stations, Naval bases in a matter of days, Pearl Harbor on Wednesday. If you, you know, were a current admiral in the Navy and you were looking at this, would you be asking yourself, is there a trend here, what do we need to look at?

JOHN KIRBY, CNN MILITARY ANALYST (via telephone): Yes, I think I would be, and I wouldn't be surprised if Navy officials are as a matter of fact as well. I mean, obviously, I'm not suggesting there's a connection between these two incidents, and they'll each be investigated separately as they should be.

I wouldn't be surprised if Navy leadership has taken -- already started to think, you know, do we have some sort of larger protocol or procedure problem that we need to deal with? Perhaps maybe it is the possession of firearms on base, I don't know or maybe just in terms of our security protocol in general.

I mean, I think it would be wise, and I am sure that they are already trying to ask those kinds of questions of themselves. The other thing that I'm sure that they're doing already, even while there is -- this is still a very active crime scene, I'm sure that they're already thinking about how they can take care of the families and the victims, and as well as looking after those who maybe have not been physically injured, but may have, you know, traumatic stress and dealing with the issues of what they saw.

I mean, I saw this one, Navy artillery, I was the head of Navy Public Affairs here in Washington when that all happened, and I was very impressed by the speed with which the Navy as an institution really tried to wrap its arms around its own people. The people that had witnessed it, certainly the people that had suffered wounds and the families of those who had been killed.

They were very quick to develop --

SCIUTTO: Yes --

KIRBY: A task force to get their hands around the kinds of issues that they were going to need going forward. So, again, that's something else --

SCIUTTO: Yes --

KIRBY: I would not be at all surprised if the Navy is already thinking about. In fact, they probably have --

SCIUTTO: Yes --

KIRBY: Already thought about it in terms of Pearl Harbor as well.

SCIUTTO: Well, listen, every community in the country has had to wrestle with this. Why it's happening and what to do about it. You know, John Kirby, I think folks at home might imagine that a military installation is all military, but as we were saying earlier, these are cities, families based with service members, children going to school on base. This is really an act of violence in the midst of an American community.

KIRBY: Oh, it is, you know, Jim, you weren't wrong at all to describe it as a small city. I mean, it very much is geographically. The Pensacola area station is huge, and there's about 20,000 or so people, almost half of that 20,000 people that work there are civilians. Great civil servants who work on the base. And we do have -- it's a family base. I mean, so, there's family housing.

Lots of children on the base as I said, our two kids -- in fact, my son was born at the Pensacola Naval hospital, we brought him right home to a house on base. There's no schools on the base because there's plenty of school options right outside the base in the city of Pensacola and in Escambia County.

So, there's no school -- but there're some day care facilities there for sure for the little ones, and there's a clinic -- I mean, it is a fully functioning small city, even a grocery store and a gas station. So, there are a lot of people there that are going to be affected by this. As I said earlier, the city of Pensacola too will be affected by this because they love the Navy.

They love the base so much and the Navy is so important to that town. And there's a lot of veterans that live off base and work on base as well. I mean, there's a real interconnectedness here to the Navy family in Pensacola that I don't think should be undercut.

HARLOW: Shimon Prokupecz is also with us. And we've just learned as Victor was reporting about the different sort of FBI teams that are going from --

SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN CRIME & JUSTICE REPORTER: Yes --

HARLOW: Mobile, Alabama, from Pensacola, et cetera. Can you talk us through what they will be doing now?

PROKUPECZ: So, these are most likely the crime scene technicians, the evidence collection, the men and women who do this. They go to the active shooter situations, they come in after that, and they put -- reconstruct the crime scene, they go over evidence. Because this is a military base, obviously, this would be a military, if there was some kind of prosecution, it would be military.

[09:25:00]

But the FBI would come in and assist in all of the evidence gathering. And that's what we're probably going to see here. That a lot of the folks that are responding are the folks that are going to be in charge of this, of gathering of this evidence. We see this time and time again that the FBI, this is what they do right after these kinds of shootings. They go in and they are kind of the clean-up team.

They come in, they reconstruct the crime scene, they gather all the evidence, and then obviously, they start to try to figure out what happened here. What was missed? Was anything missed? They go through all of the social media stuff, and then they start going through their own databases to see if there's anything that they knew about this, perhaps, is there anything that they know about the shooter, is there anything that they know that was going on, and in particular, was there any intelligence that they received concerning something maybe happening at this --

HARLOW: Yes --

PROKUPECZ: Base. So that's what they're going to do here. They're already very much active, involved, trying to figure out, obviously, always the big question is terrorism, we don't know that yet here, it's probably unlikely. But that is something that is always on their mind --

HARLOW: Yes --

PROKUPECZ: And something that they would deal with. So, you have all of that going on. So you know, still trying to figure out exactly what the motive is here, obviously, and what happened. So, that's still very much in the air right now, yes --

HARLOW: Shimon, thank you.

PROKUPECZ: Sure --

HARLOW: Don't go far, thank you very much. Jim?

SCIUTTO: Well, here we are, Poppy, America in 2019, another shooting in another American community. This community, the Naval Air Station in Pensacola, Florida. The latest information we have the shooter now dead. We don't know if that's by self-inflicted gunshot wound or by law enforcement response.

Another fatality confirmed, a total of five casualties, some of them being treated at the hospital you're watching right there as we see emergency medical services waiting at least for the possibility of additional casualties. That's the latest we have. We're going to stay on top of this story and we'll be right back.

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