After a gunman opened fire into a crowd in Las Vegas, killing 59 and injuring hundreds more, we’re hearing more stories from West Texas locals who attended the country Route 91 Music Festival.
One of those victims was Shauna Vasquez who was celebrating her ninth anniversary with her husband at the concert.
“Screaming, so confused. The shots are coming and they’re just not stopping,” Vasquez said of the horrific event.
At first, like many other witnesses, the Vasquez couple believed the gun shots were fireworks, which they thought were a part of the show.
“What made us realize this was real was that the guy behind us, he dropped to the ground,” said Vasquez. “We saw blood, we saw his wife grabbing him, screaming for him to wake up.”
For minutes, they were frozen to the ground, not sure of what to do. Eventually they decided they needed to leave the venue and get as far away from the gunshots as possible.
“People were so confused, it didn’t really sound like fire. We didn’t know what that sound was,” she said. “The sound will probably haunt us forever.”
They started crawling on their hands and knees through the crowd of bodies and screaming victims, something Vasquez said she’ll never be able to get out of her head.
“There was a girl out their on her own, just blood covered, just lifeless,” she said. “And we had to crawl right by her. Literally crawling through other people’s body parts. It was horrible.”
Eventually, they made it to a basement of a hotel where they took a photo of them holding hands to send to their eight-year-old daughter. They still were unsure if the shooter was targeting people or if the shooter was caught. They thought this would be their last photo.
“I thought that was going to be the last thing I was going to have. That was part of me giving my daughter something at the very end, of just me and my husband holding hands,” Vasquez said.
The Vasquez family said they often go to concerts but now said they’re not sure if they’ll ever be able to go to concert again after living through this.
