Abbott said the gunman, identified as18-year-old Salvador Ramos, apparently was killed by police officers respondingto the scene, and that two of those officers were struck by gunfire, though thegovernor said their injuries were not serious.
Authorities said the suspect actedalone.
Official details on the circumstances ofthe midday shooting remained sketchy in the immediate aftermath of theviolence, which unfolded at Robb Elementary School in the town of Uvalde,Texas, about 80 miles west of San Antonio.
"He shot and killed horrifically,incomprehensibly, 14 students and killed a teacher. Mr. Ramos, the shooter, hehimself is deceased and it’s believed that responding officers killedhim," Abbott told a news briefing.
According to CNN, the gunman drove up tothe school and entered with a rifle and a handgun.
The student body at the school consistsof children in the second, third and fourth grades, according to PeteArredondo, chief of the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District PoliceDepartment, who also addressed reporters.
University Hospital in San Antonio saidon Twitter it had received two patients from the shooting in Uvalde, one childand one adult. Both patients, a 66-year-old woman and a 10-year-old girl, werelisted in critical condition.
The Texas rampage was the latest in aseries of mass shootings in US schools that have shocked the world and fuelleda fierce debate between advocates of tighter gun controls and those who opposeany legislation that could compromise the right of Americans to bear arms.
The shooting in Texas was one of thedeadliest at a US school since a gunman killed 26 people, including 20 childrenfrom five- to 10-years old, in a rampage at Sandy Hook Elementary School inConnecticut in December 2012.
In 2018, a former student at MarjoryStoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, killed 17 students andeducators.
