A 10-year-old boy was among those caught up in the Tennessee church shooting that left one woman dead and six worshippers injured.
At first, Jeremiah thought the gunshots were fireworks, he said, explaining the moment when he started to hear gunfire.
Jeremiah was with others in the church but in a separate room from the gunman,
“When I heard more and more and more I thought ‘OK those aren’t fireworks,’” he said, The Tennessean reported.
“When I heard someone scream ‘Get down’ and more screaming, I grabbed a couch and turned it on its side and I got a table and I got chairs and I just put chairs and chairs [by the door],” he said.
Melanie Smith, a 39-year-old mother of two was killed in the shooting, according to authorities.
The suspect shot and injured himself as he struggled with a church usher, 22-year-old Robert Caleb Engle, who was struck in the head by the suspect’s gun, reports said. Engle then managed to go to his car to fetch his gun, officials said, and came back to guard the injured gunman until the police arrived.
Metropolitan Nashville Police spokesman Don Aaron described Engle as “exceptionally brave.”
He was released from hospital at some point on Sunday night and is now resting with his family, per the news outlet.