Taft Union High School: Terror at Californian high school as gunman shoots two

Two people were shot in a Califoia high school on Thursday moing and police have taken the 16-year-old shooter into custody. The shooting took place at Taft Union High School just outside of Bakersfield, Califoia and began around 9am.

One victim- a student- was airlifted to a local hospital and is reportedly in critical condition after being shot in the shoulder. The student was taken into surgery and is now in a coma.

The second victim was said to be a teacher at the school but he had very minor injuries and he refused medical attention on the scene.

The teacher was reportedly the one who talked the shooter down when he walked into the classroom with a 12-guage shotgun and up to 20 rounds of ammunition.

The shooting comes as schools across the country are on high alert less than a month after the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut where 20 children and six adults were killed.

Official word: Taft Police Chief Ed Whiting talked to the parents who came to the school after two people were injured- one of which seriously- during a shooting on Thursday moing

Emergency response: Local and federal officials immediately responded to the shooting and went room by room to inspect the school after they apprehended the suspect

Waiting for word: Parents gather outside of Taft Union High School while they wait to collect their children from the scene of the latest school shooting

At the time of Thursday's shooting, the school bell had rung at a nearby school so students at Taft Union High School began to leave their classrooms and the principal used the intercom to tell students to get back inside with teachers screaming for them to do the same.

A number of students at the Califoia school called 911 and their parents on their cell phones from inside the school once they heard the sound of the gunshot.

One girl called 911 then called her mother saying that she was in the classroom where the student had been shot and that the victim was lying on the ground in a pool of blood.

'My friend's been shot,  the teacher's been shot- I don't know what to do,' the girl reportedly said to her mother on her cell phone.

A friend of the injured student tweeted that the victim had to go into surgery after being hit in the shoulder with a shotgun.

The victim, thought to be a male student in his junior year at the school, sustained injuries to his liver, lung and diaphragm due to the direction of the bullet.

The local ABC affiliate received two separate calls from people who were hiding in closets during the incident, and the shooter- who is believed to be a student at the school- was taken into custody by police at around 9.20am.

The shooting took place in the physical sciences building on campus, and the West Ke Water District building was put on lock-down as a precaution because it is located right next to the school, according to Bakersfield Califoian.

As of 11am, officials from the Ke County Sheriff's Department were still checking each room in the school.

Securing the grounds: Police in bullet-proof vests are seen leaving the science building where the shooting took place

Lining up: Anxious parents get ready to pick up their students at Taft High School as well as a neighboring middle school

The sheriff confirmed that one student was shot and had to be airlifted to Ke Medical Center with undisclosed injuries.

The second person reported only minor injuries and refused medical treatment at the scene. Neither of the individuals have been identified, only to say that the one with more serious injuries was a student at the school.

Ray Pruitt, the spokesman for the Ke County Sheriff, said that a shotgun was used in the attack and the suspect is thought to be a student at the school.

Parents are being told to pick up all of the other students at the school's football field immediately.

The public school is located in the small town of Taft which is about an hour's drive outside of Bakersfield in southe Califoia.

The nearby middle school- Lincoln Junior High School- was shut down as a waing when the shooting at Taft Union School was reported.

Felicity Reich, 13, said that her teachers told all of the students that a shooting had taken place at the high school.

'They were all trying to keep each other happy and not flip out,' she said of students trying to keep one another calm. 

Buzzfeed reports that a student admitted to falsely waing of a school shooting at Taft Union High School in December.

Medical attention: The one seriously injured student was airlifted by helicopter to a local hospital

On the ground: Republican congressman Kevin McCarthy was at the school leading up to the press conference

It is unclear if that student had anything to do with today's shooting, but when questioned by police in December he admitted that his threat was false.

Republican congressman Kevin McCarthy was quick to release his condolences over Twitter, saying: 'I am deeply saddened and troubled by news of the shooting. Judy and I offer our prayers to the victims, their families and the entire Taft community.'

He was present on the scene shortly after the shooting along with all relevant local officials.

'All the resources one can possibly imagine to respond to a horrible tragedy are here,' Taft City Councilman Dave Noerr told the Bakersfield Califoian after arriving at the scene.

Latest incident: Taft Union High School was the scene of a school shooting on Thursday moing and initial reports said that two people were injured but only one needed medical attention

Shooting: Two people were reported as being shot at Taft Union High School outside of Bakersfield in Califoia

'This is a small community. We're one big family.

'We're doing everything we can for each other.'

The school was originally opened in 1912 and one of it's biggest claims to fame was that it was featured in a 1986 film starring Robin Williams and Kurt Russell called The Best of Times.

The shooting comes just less than a month since the horrific shooting took place at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut that left 20 children dead along with six adult educators.