Las Vegas shooting: 58 killed, more than 500 injured

Las Vegas, Nevada (NBC News) – A lone gunman released a rapid-fire barrage of bullets from a 32nd-floor Las Vegas hotel room late Sunday, killing at least 58 people and injuring more than 515 others at an outdoor country music festival, police said.

It was the worst mass shooting in modern American history.

The shooter, who was identified by law enforcement officials as Stephen Craig Paddock, 64, of Mesquite, Nevada, fired shot after shot from the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino down on the crowd of about 22,000, sending terrified concertgoers running for their lives.

“We heard what sounded like firecrackers going off. Then all of a sudden we heard what sounded like a machine gun. People started screaming that they were hit,” witness Meghan Kearney told MSNBC. “When we started running out, there were probably a couple hundred [people] on the ground.”

She added: “People kept dropping and dropping … People were getting shot one foot away from us. People were trying to save their friends. There were gunshots everywhere. Helping them would’ve meant that we got shot, too.”

The Latest:

58 people were killed, more than 500 injured in deadliest mass shooting in modern American history.
Gunman identified as Stephen Paddock, a 64-year-old man from Mesquite, Nevada.
At least 10 weapons were found inside Paddock’s room at the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino.
President Trump, who will visit Las Vegas on Wednesday, called the shooting “an act of pure evil.”