The shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut, on December 14, 2012, killed 20 children and six school staff
The shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut, on December 14, 2012, killed 20 children and six school staff (Picture: Reuters)

Ten years ago, a gunman entered Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut, and shot dead 20 students and six school staff members.

The massacre on December 14, 2012, shocked the nation, with many Americans not believing a rampage of its scale could happen or would ever again.

It set off a push for tighter gun control laws. But a decade later, school shootings have continued to break out across the US.

People gather around the Sandy Hook Permanent Memorial in Newtown, Connecticut, on December 13, 2022
People gather around the Sandy Hook Permanent Memorial in Newtown, Connecticut, on December 13, 2022 (Picture: Getty Images)

In Uvalde, Texas, a gunman killed 19 children and two teachers in May. It is the latest large-scale shooting in the country that has had a constant gun violence problem.

Since the Sandy Hook massacre, there have been 189 school shootings with at least one fatality, according to the independent K-12 School Shooting Database research organization. The shootings included domestic violence and people turning the gun on themselves. A total of 279 people have been killed at schools.

Of those nearly 200 incidents, 17 were ‘active shooter situations’ involving a person killing or injuring victims in an episode at a school campus, BBC reported. Those incidents accounted for more than one-third of all the fatalities.

People embrace in the aftermath of the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, on December 14, 2012
People embrace in the aftermath of the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, on December 14, 2012 (Picture: Getty Images)

Sandy Hook was the worst school shooting in the nation’s history to date in 2012.

Then-President Barack Obama pushed for measures aimed at curbing gun violence, including reducing magazine sizes, but none of them were enacted during his term.

Congress this year passed the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act imposing stricter background checks for gun purchasers aged 18 to 21. It also called for $13billion in funds for violence prevention and mental health programs.

President Joe Biden embraces Jackie Hegarty, a Sandy Hook school shooting survivor, during the 10th annual national Vigil for All Victims of Gun Violence in Washington, DC, on December 7
President Joe Biden embraces Jackie Hegarty, a Sandy Hook school shooting survivor, during the 10th annual national Vigil for All Victims of Gun Violence in Washington, DC, on December 7 (Picture: Reuters)

President Joe Biden in June signed the gun control bill into law, but it did not reinstate a ban on assault-style firearms that was in place pre-2004.

Biden on the 10th anniversary of Sandy Hook on Wednesday said the US ‘should have societal guilt for taking too long to deal with this problem’ of restricting gun access.

‘We have a moral obligation to pass and enforce laws that can prevent these things from happening again,’ stated Biden. ‘We owe it to the courageous, young survivors and to the families who lost part of their soul ten years ago to turn their pain into purpose.’

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