At least 59 people have been killed and more than 500 injured after a gunman opened fire on crowds at a music festival in Las Vegas in the worst mass shooting in US history.
Two revellers at the Route 91 festival said they initially heard a noise “like firecrackers”, but it became apparent a shooter was unloading “clip after clip” into the crowd, discharging hundreds of bullets using an automatic weapon.
Police later identifed the “lone wolf” suspect as 64-year-old white male Stephen Paddock from Nevada.
Las Vegas Sheriff Joseph Lombardo said Paddock was neutralised in a hotel room on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Hotel. Police later said that 23 guns had been found in the hotel room, while another 19 guns were found at a property occupied by Paddock about 80 miles away in Mesquite, Nevada.
Associated Press are reporting that an accessory known as a bump-stock was discovered in Paddock’s Las Vegas hotel room, which may have enabled him to fire into the crowd at near-automatic levels.
AP are citing two officials on the investigation who spoke on the condition of anonymity. They said two bump-stocks were discovered in Paddock’s room, but were still investigating whether they were actually used in the attack.
The accessory works by using a gun’s own recoil to bump against the user’s trigger finger – enabling an increased rate of fire.
With a bump-stock, someone can get around restrictions on automatic weapons by firing a semi-automatic weapon at nearly an automatic rate.
