October 1,2017. A night that many will remember, a night that brought us to a realization that horrific incidents can happen to anyone and to any nation. It was a kind of night that Las Vegas and its people weren't prepared for. At 10:07 pm, a heavily armed white male sprayed bullets over a crowd of 22000 people, give or take. It was the third and last night of Route 91 Harvest Country music festival. Jason Aldean was performing on the stage and attendants were enjoying the festival to its bits. Some thought it was fireworks that is expected to happen by the end of the festival while some thought there was a technical problem with the acoustics. Nonetheless, Jason Aldean left the stage in a hurry, strings of guitars suddenly came to a stop and people who were singing and dancing in front of the heavily lit stage silenced. They started looking left and right to see the response of their fellow attendants. Some realized that bullets have been fired and there are numerous wounded people moaning and crying in pain, asking for help while some couldn't even ask for help. It was an open-air festival and the assailant had a bird's eye view of the whole arena from the 32nd floor of renowned state of the art Mandalay Bay resort and casino. There was a panic and sense of urgency developed among people in no time. They started running in every direction whenever the sound of showering bullets stopped and started ducking when the sound started again. A fully automatic gun was being used by the shooter and it only takes seconds to spray hundreds of bullets with that weapon. It was not a kind of weapon that is used for self-defense. In no time, entire strip was in a palpable shock. Cops arrived at the scene within minutes and vantage point was identified amidst spraying bullets. Goal was to neutralize the shooter as soon as possible so that no more people fall to his bullets'victim. And that goal was achieved under supervision of gallant and highly competent Sheriff of Las Vegas Police Department.
No one realized at that very moment that how much damage that psychopath had done until after few hours. 59 innocent lives were wasted and more than 500 people were wounded. There was a state of emergency in almost every hospital of the city. Numerous weapons were recovered from the room of the gunman. Motive, still unclear. Ambulances roaring all over the city. Injured individuals were also being transported by the first responders in their private vehicles. It was a blood bath in Vegas.
Silenced prevailed in the ensuing hours. Strip was closed and thorough investigation began. Everyone was at sea to hear about this horrific act of terrorism. Police department in conjunction with FBI handled the incident with terrific bravery. Many questions were born after this incident and many are still unanswered. The real question that we, as a nation, should ask ourselves is,are we safe now or we should be prepared for such attacks in future too. No one can answer this question yet, no one will be able to answer this query even in the future probably. I am not concerned about what we are labeling this incident as, either he was a 'lone wolf' or a 'terrorist'. we have different standards for different individuals nowadays depending on their age, gender and most importantly, the ethnicity. The Patriot Act defines domestic terrorism as an attempt to "intimidate or coerce a civilian population; to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping. And to be charged with terrorism, a person has to be suspected of acting on behalf of one of nearly 60 groups that the State Department has declared a foreign terrorist organization. I won't go into the details of that because it is not going to have an impact of what has already taken place. Innocent lives have been wasted, happy families have been shredded into pieces and a city full of happiness and joy has seen the darkest of times. Things will be back to normal in a few days for all of us and we would barely remember the date of the incident but for those who have lost their loved ones, things would never be the same again.
Pray for Las Vegas, Pray for humanity.
Farhan Rashid
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