Cops respond to shooting at DC Navy Yard (courtesy washingtonpost.com)

“Police now believe two shooters, including one in fatigues, have killed four people and wounded eight others at the Washington Navy Yard on Monday, throwing the region into fear and chaos during the morning commute,” washingtonpost.com reports. [UPDATE: the press seems to be backing off multiple shooters in favor of a “thin, bald, male and is carrying an assault weapon.”] “At least one of the shooters is ‘down,’ police said mid-morning, but it was unclear whether that means the suspect has been arrested or shot. They said the other suspect remains at large, and police believe they have pinned down one between the third and fourth floors of one of the buildings on the installation in Southeast Washington.” Another gun-free zone spree killing, then, only with more security, as the Post reveals . . .

In a number of tweets from the base, employees expressed their fright. One tweet said people were stuck on the fourth floor of the headquarters building, while the shooter was firing from the third floor. Others wrote of being incredulous that a shooter could get inside the building . . .

“The President has been briefed several times about the unfolding situation at the Washington Navy Yard by Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism Lisa Monaco and Deputy Chief of Staff Alyssa Mastromanaco,” the official said. “The President directed his team to stay in touch with our federal partners, including the Navy and FBI, as well as the local officials. We urge citizens to listen to the authorities and follow directions from the first responders on site.”

We’ve said it before, we’ll say it again: the people who are attacked are the first responders. Beside and because, when seconds count, the cops are only minutes away. Or, as NBC reports, more than an hour.

The Navy said on its Twitter feed that three shots were fired at 8:20 a.m. ET at the Sea Systems Command headquarters. Almost an hour later, the Navy still characterized the shooter as “active.” The military officials said that the gunman may have been armed with an AR-15, a military-style assault rifle.

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102 COMMENTS

    • No children died. There will be a few calls for bans, but they only really get worked up with they have really small bloody shirts to wave – they know that will get them the emotional response they want. Workplace violence doesn’t quite do it for the anti’s.

      • Agreed, sounds more like an act of war or terrorism. It’ll be interesting to learn about the background of the shooters. One of them is supposed to be African-American which is an interesting wrinkle.

      • I’m thinking Ft. Hood, round 2. One does not just waltz onto a military base with an AR 15. Especially in DC.

        BTW, the Marine Barracks are literally “right next door.”

    • Weapons are banned on post, unless you are an MP. This is why I won’t live on post or take my family on post, even if the commissary is cheaper.

  3. Incredulous at what? The fact that signs couldn’t protect them from determined people with guns? I thought that would be obvious?

    • It might be stooping to using Liberal tactics, but I think this incident should be used to press fast and press hard for the repeal of gun-free zone legislation. It’s pretty damned obvious to anyone with a IQ higher than a glass of water that GFZs do not work.

  7. A building with a sign that says “No guns allowed” inside a fence with a sign that says “No guns allowed” inside another fence with a sign that says “No guns allowed” inside a city which has a rule of “No guns allowed.” And this still happens.

    Apparently their defintion of “layered defenses” and mine are somewhat different.

    • Someone needs to have a political cartoon with one character holding a gun free zone sign hiding behind gun fire and shouting “read the sign, read the sign, why will you not read and follow what the sign says” all the while the sign is full of bullet holes.

      Actually, I would love that as a T-shirt.

  8. How about we all wait until there are more facts. As we have seen over and over again with these things, it is too fluid and the MSM just races for headlines often with little fact.

    Having just seen the CNN and Fox headlines change multiple times already, people should just wait until there are some official updates.

  11. First I heard a 6′ black male with a shotgun now it is two perps, including 6′ black male with an AR.

    If they are Jihadi wannabes they might have shown up with one of those Turkish shotguns that looks like an AR.

  12. Reminds me of that Fox News skit on Gun Free Zones.

    “Gimme the goods you old bitty!”

    –old woman points to Gun Free Zone sign

    “Aww darn,not again.”-shotgun toting scumbag leaves the store dejected .

  13. This is just insane, the Navy last time I checked was part of US defense, when will they grow a set and arm-up on US bases?

    • The Navy Yard has a large contingent of Masters-at-Arms to provide security. NCIS HQ used to be there but they move to Quantico two years ago. (Not because someone blew it up. I am surprised they didn’t build the move into the show.)

    • And what if a foreign military wanted to attack or just plain acquire secret files and information? No problem: send in two guys with rifles who will have the run of the facility. Talk about easy.

      These are @#%#*$ military facilities and bases … everyone should be armed!

      Whoever disarmed our military personnel committed treason. Let’s start petitioning our elected representatives to:
      (1) Immediately require most military personnel to be armed.
      (2) Find and prosecute the person/s who mandated that military personnel be disarmed.

      • “And what if a foreign military wanted to attack or just plain acquire secret files and information? No problem: send in” …the cleaning crew. Nobody ever pays any attention to them. #OPSEC

  14. That cop just isn’t being tacticool. Perhaps confused on which camo to use. Should go with all purpose cop webebaaaad black? Fall is starting in DC and leaves are changing so do go with.mil woodland multicam or a tan ensemble. A Navy installation so do you go with that nifty shipboard Blue camo BS, Jarheads in the area? go with a MARPAT varient? So hard to decide what to wear.

  15. Gun free zones work. The BGs were obviously uninformed and didn’t realize that they were in violation there. They need bigger signs.

  16. Jennifer on FOX suggested that it definitely was an AR 15 because initially 3 shots were fired and that’s the way an AR 15 works!!!! Three shot bursts….where do they find these people?

    • Well, an M-16 is an AR-15 — but not all AR-15’s are M-16’s.

      Tortoises and turtles…

      Yes, that’s humor — een though it’s almost true.

  17. Only thing for sure so far is that this hoplophobic administration and its flunkies will be demonstrating anguish and panic while running around like stuck pigs pining for more gun controls. What emotin’ idiots they are.

    More controls of course would prevent determined, uncontrollable law BREAKERS from doing “scary” things like bringing prohibited firearms onto a military installation and shooting the place up. /end sarc/

    No doubt the bad guys can read the no firearms signs posted at the entrance to the installation. Only the lame brains in this administration and other idiot grabbers would think the bad guys care about such prohibitations and will comply.

    Only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.

    I think I heard that somewhere before.

    • “Only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. ”

      Of course, all of the anti’s will mercilessly mock you for making this statement, all the while watching on TV as thousands of good-guys (generally speaking) with guns are the first people they expect to see running into the situation.

      If they truly didn’t believe the original statement, why don’t we send in unarmed negotiators or psychologists ahead of the SWAT teams?

  18. Great, now they’ll be calling for more military spending to upgrade their defenses on bases and push for more civilian disarmament. Later on we’ll get some info on the background of the perpetrator(s). That will define the rhetoric used. Chances are these aren’t your run-of-the-mill civilians just walking through multiple layers of security with prohibited firearms.

    • My gut tells me the Muslim Brotherhood is angry they’re not getting air support in Syria or back up in Egypt. For Obama’s sake, I hope I’m wrong.

  20. Its all Emily Miller’s fault !!! If she hadn’t “Got Her Gun”, Washington DC would be a safe place !!!

  21. Waiting for the White House, Dianne Feinstein, and the antique media to determine where the blame for this shooting lies: It was the eeeevil NRA and American gun owners who kept the President and minions from passing their anti-gun agenda. “This could have been prevented if the NRA hadn’t blocked our common-sense gun laws.”

    Counting down: 5, 4, 3, …

  23. Were, or are these shooters after something, or are they just shooting to shoot people?
    My question is, what’s on the third floor of this building? Were they just trapped there,
    or were they going there for a purpose yet unknown? Inquiring minds, and all that.

  24. This seems to be the new thread so I will repeat the post:

    This incident highlights all the things wrong with gun control laws. This is not an ordinary gun free zone. To pull this off the shooter had to go through a gate with armed guards and through a building entrance with armed guards to get to his objective. I am guessing that the shooter is an insider. Someone who the guards would know and would not have to pass through metal detectors. Every secure building I ever went to on a regular basis allowed me unfettered access because I had a badge and a pin.

    If you can’t keep guns out of NAVSEA in the Navy Yard you can’t keep them from across the Mexican border or brought in on a plane or boat.

    • First rule on “Security Zones”-there is no such thing.If nothing else, one of the LEOs providing security themselves will go nuts and use their duty guns to effect the mass murder.See Chris Dorner for reference.

      Second rule-DoD security is a joke,unfortunately.While im sure there’s exceptions to this statement, two of my Air Force duty stations didn’t even have armed security at the main gate.Just a lonely E-3 armed with a beret and a smike,his radio taking up space in the booth 10 feet away from the street.If someone just drove past him ,parked the car ,and got out shooting it would take 10 horrible minutes at least for the BDOC to send a response unit.*

      -* while my AF job wasn’t Security Forces,military regs mandated my CCW handgun had to be stored at the SF armory .That meant daily trips to the BDOC to sign out my carry gun whenever I left post, so I chewed the fat with a lot of cops despite being a support troop by profession.I learned a few things in the process.

      • The security at the Navy yard has traditionally been better than your average base for several reasons ranging from the presence of Intelligence Community facilities to anti-gangbanger patrol. The guards aren’t rent-a-cops. They are either armed FPS police or Masters-at-Arms. The will shoot you if they have to. However, if you have the appropriate ID, you have access. At least until today, I could walk onto the Navy Yard without a challenge based on my retired DoD identification card. Unless I was carrying my AR or shotgun over the shoulder nobody would know the better.

        • To get into a controlled building in the MDW you get to empty your pockets and walk through a metal detector. Everybody gets to play…

        • Not true if you have a badge. At the Pentagon occasionally, by which I mean you might get selected for screening during off hours once a year, they would ask you to go through the metal detector.. I also had a “Community Badge.” I could get into CIA HQ by showing badge at the gate and pinning in at the turnstiles. Same for every three letter agency and DoD facility in Metropolitan Washington

        • And you get the DoD/IC badge how? Also, ya think maybe all those guys in the grey clothing are looking over each and every badged person and touching badges so that can wave the nut jobs with long arms through because they have a badge? C’mon.

          And if you don’t work there, you get to play. I’ve been given grief for a cigarette lighter.

  25. My bet is disgruntled employees due to sequester and furlough.

    Thanks congress and president for being unable to set a budget on schedule.

    • As a federal employee who was “affected” by the sequester, I can tell you it was a joke from the beginning. What started off as a massive scare of 22 days forced off turned out to be a grand total of 6 sequester days off. Hardship? Not in the least. Most of us enjoyed our 6 Mondays off.

      The sequester scare was just that, a scare designed to empower the current administration by scaring people into thinking it was the opposing party’s fault and that he is on our side and would help us.

      I did not fall for it.

      Don’t fall for the sequestration b.s.

      • I know people at that yard and others who have been laid off or furloughed. It wasn’t a big joke to them. Whether it was the sequester or just the uncertainty causing departments to position themselves in a defensive crouch, people are being deeply affected by the circus.

  26. Obama will be doing a white house garden speech on it soon today in hopes he can get more support to continue the liberal agenda of gun disarmament.
    As far as I have heard, it is now just a single gunman responsible. Most likely a veteran or employee who was angry about being shafted in some way. If you go by the headlines on most news sites you’d think we are under attack. I’m so sick of the extreme overkill police and media responses to these shootings.

    • “.gov/.mil types”???

      What planet do you live on? The navy yard at Anacostia is one of the only remaining shards of America’s shipbuilding industry on the East Coast. The workers there are largely civilian. The industry itself–and the jobs in it–were offshored starting in the 1970s.

  28. I have a good friend who works there and is keeping me apprised. At this time I’m not going into any details (so as to protect him), but he is FURIOUS that he’s disarmed at work and so are a lot of other guys in his department.

    • I hope your friend is safe! If our soldiers were allowed to carry weapons…this would have ended very quickly.

    • Tell him it is for his own good, because if he had a gun there might have been a tragedy!

      Besides, he is in a gen-u-wine Gummint Gun Free Zone, so he is perfectly safe!

      /sarc off/

    • So what is your friend doing to be proactive? If I were there, I would be piling up heavy objects (like desks) and obstacles (like chairs, copy machines, shelves) in front of stairwell and elevator doors. I would also station people with fire extinguishers at every entry door. And I would locate as many objects as possible that can serve as improvised weapons — anything that can be a club (brooms and mop handles could be spears as well as clubs), hard objects that people can throw (rocks, staplers, paper weights, glasses, coffee mugs), boiling water in coffee decanters, and even spray cans of flammable liquids for short range flame throwers.

      And consider how to impede progress down hallways. More obstacles, slippery floors (liquids or even paper on the floors can be slippery), and trip wires (made from power cords and communication cabling) either visible or hidden underneath debris.

      Tell your friend to FIGHT BACK!

  29. If “assault wapons” are so evil, why do the police always show up to thes incidents with them in tow?

    Funny how we never hear what medications these wackos are on but hear every detail about the weapons they carry.

  30. Live press conference says two men at large – white male with a handgun, khaki uniform with a beret as well as an older black male with an olive drab uniform and a long gun. One suspect dead.

    This sounds like it could be politically motivated terrorism, perhaps blowback from Libya?

    • If it’s politically motivated blowback from Libya, then it’s not terrorism. It’s combat against a legitimate military target.

        • I think there was quite a bit of blowback from Grozny in Russia. I don’t mean to offend with my choice of terms, it is just that the media hasn’t been saying a whole lot about Libya lately and the job was never really finished.

          Gaddafi had good relations with the Nation of Islam, it is not inconceivable that some radicals chose to take action in military garb.

        • I was being sarcastic because it seems that according to some people all Muslim blow back happens to the Untied States even if the Russians, Indians or whomever was responsible. These people, and you know who I am talking about, think that only Muslims have a right to attack other people without consequence. I have yet to see blowback from Serbs even though we destroyed their country.

    • Try getting into the Pentagon. Or DHS. Or FBI. Some places are harder than others. All have security perimeters of some kind.

  33. I really hope this is just an isolated case like Nidal or Dorner, and not a national security problem. Someone can use this to further an agenda… like attacking a certain country.

    • Watch NSA hop right on this with “We could have prevented this if we hoovered the phone calls and Internet and text messages of Americans CONUS.” Since they already do now, but any PR is good PR…

  34. If it turns out to be a true case of “workplace violence,” there will be another Obama call for citizen disarmament to keep us safe. If it’s terrorism, then it will be called workplace violence because Obama is already keeping us all safe from terrorism.

  35. The NYT photo here is a good one.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/17/us/shooting-reported-at-washington-navy-yard.html

    http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2013/09/16/us/20130917_dcshoot_hp-slide-5UD3/20130917_dcshoot_hp-slide-5UD3-articleLarge.jpg

    Buncha official guys in expensive vests with expensive weapons and smartphones. Milling around aimlessly, since the dirty deed is over and done.

    Meanwhile, the “military-style clothing” individuals carrying “military-style assault-rifle(s)” are not found. I.e., by the paramilitary agents of law enforcement.

    (shaking head)

    • “Military style uniforms”

      Heh.

      Can’t say multicam, ACU, or MARPAT without offending someone anymore?

    • Here is the beauty of all those responders: none of those guys know anyone from a different “agency” and probably don’t even know many of the people from their own agency. If you were a criminal, all you would have to do is wear tacticool clothing with an acronym in large yellow letters (pick any three letters you want) on the front and back of your ballistic vest (that doesn’t even have to be a real ballistic vest — it just has to look real) and you could walk anywhere without any challenge whatsoever.

      Oh, make sure you have a small two-way radio on your belt, a sidearm, and an AR15 in hand. You’ll be good to go.

  36. I heard a female reporter on Fox “explain” to the Public how the shooter was armed with an AR-15, “the civilian version of the M-16” She went on to say that that this explained how some witnesses had reported that three shots were fired, because “this weapon fires in three shot bursts”.

    Please, members of the 4th Estate, if you don’t know what you are talking about don’t comment.

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