AURORA, Ill. -- A gunman opened fire at a manufacturing plant Friday in suburban Chicago, killing five people and wounding five police officers before he was fatally shot, police said.
Aurora Police Chief Kristen Ziman said at a news conference that the gunman was 45-year-old Gary Martin and said he was a 15-year employee at the Henry Pratt Co. in the city about 40 miles west of Chicago. She said he "was being terminated" Friday afternoon before he opened fire.
She told reporters that officers arrived within four minutes of receiving reports of the shooting and were fired upon as soon as they entered the 29,000-square-foot manufacturing warehouse.
"May God bless the brave law enforcement officers who continue to run toward danger," Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker said at the news conference.
Hospitals reported treating at least seven patients from the shooting, though their conditions weren't released. Two of the officers were airlifted to trauma centers in Chicago, Ziman said. Officials did not say the total number of people injured other than the police officers.
Live TV reports showed dozens of first responder vehicles outside a building housing the Henry Pratt Co. in Aurora, a city of about 200,000 people.
Several Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives teams responded to the shooting, according to the agency's Chicago spokesman, and the FBI also responded.
John Probst, an employee at the plant, told ABC7 that he ran out of the back door as the shooting unfolded Friday afternoon. Probst said he recognized the gunman and that he works for the company.
"What I saw was the guy running down the aisle with a pistol with a laser on it," Probst said.
Probst said he wasn't hurt but that another colleague was "bleeding pretty bad."
The company makes valves for industrial purposes.
The White House said President Donald Trump was briefed on the shooting and monitoring the situation as he prepared to depart for a weekend trip to his home in Palm Beach, Fla.
Sen. Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., tweeted Friday that she was following the situation. "This is a scary, sad day for all Illinoisans and Americans," Duckworth wrote. "Thank you to the brave first responders who risked their lives this afternoon and apprehended the shooter."
"My heart breaks for Aurora," Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill., tweeted. "I'm tracking updates on the situation with my staff. Thank you to the members of law enforcement who are responding to the emergency."
Presence Mercy Medical Center was treating two patients and a third had been transferred by helicopter to another hospital, spokesman Matt Wakely said. Advocate Good Samaritan Hospital and Advocate Lutheran General Hospital each had one patient from the shooting, spokesman Kate Eller said. Rush Copley Medical Center received three patients from the shooting and all are being treated for injuries that aren't life-threatening, spokesman Courtney Satlak said.
Information for this article was contributed by Michael Brice-Saddler, Emily Wax-Thibodeaux and Reis Thebault of The Washington Post.
A Section on 02/16/2019