The manager of the bowling alley that was attacked by Maine mass shooter Robert Card, saved the lives of “countless” children during the attack.
Sparetime manager Thomas Giberti protected children at the Lewiston, Maine bowling alley when Card, 40, shot up the place with an automatic weapon during a children’s bowling league.
According to a Facebook post by New England Bowling, Giberti “risked his life leading countless kids to safety, while under fire from the gunman during last night’s mass shooting.”
He was one of the 31 people who were killed or injured during the unhinged Army reservist went on a rampage on Wednesday.
Maine mass shooting
According to Kenny Moore, the president of the youth bowling league, who was at Wednesday night’s practice, where 15 children between seven and eighteen were present, “There was carnage everywhere.”
“I heard a pop go off inside the bowling alley. It was the loudest bang that I’ve ever heard in the bowling alley, and I’ve been in bowling alleys since I was 6,” Moore told Newsnation. “They came in to practice bowling and the night turned into chaos.”
He explained that Giberti was one of three people who tried to stop the shooter, and each of those men were shot.
“No one could get to him. At that point, he was firing rounds,” Moore said.
In a stroke of luck, the gun jammed and Card decided to leave. “If that gun hadn’t jammed, if he didn’t have trouble with that AR-style rifle, would he have made it down that aisle to where I was,” he wondered.
Bowling alley manager becomes victim of Maine mass shooting
Giberti was shot several times in the legs for his bravery and is fighting to stay alive at a local hospital.
‘My Uncle was one of the victim’s working at Sparetime bowling ally in Lewiston, Maine. He was shot multiple times in his legs and is currently in surgery,” his nephew Will Bourgault wrote on Facebook.
According to the post, Giberti ushered six lanes of children safely out the back door of the bowling alley, before rushing the shooter.
Remarkably he came through surgery and was successfully stabilized after being shot in the left leg four times.
Another everyday hero who emerged from the tragedy was the retired police officer father of Riley Dumont, who was at the bowling alley along with her family for her 11-year-old daughter’s practice.
She told ABC News that her fatehr protected others during the shooting.
“My dad’s been a police officer for 40 years and he literally just went into action in that moment and just kind of corralled us all and made sure we were all safe,” Dumont explained.
“He was waiting for the cops to walk through the front door and he put protection in front of us and tables and like a big bench that the kids were hiding behind.”
Maine mass shooting has multiple heroes
While she gave credit to her father, Dumont and her mother kept others safe by trying to make sure that the “whimpering” victims stayed silent.
“My mom and I were just trying to keep everybody quiet and consoling each other,” she said. “The sounds that I heard were only closest to me and then the gunshots were all I remember hearing.”
“I was laying on top of my daughter. My mother was laying on top of me,” Dumont noted. “It felt like it lasted a lifetime.”
The shooting’s youngest victim, Zoey Hutchinson, 10, was among the group who took cover.
“I never thought I’d go and get a bullet in my leg,” she said to ABC News. “Why do people do this?”
“I was more worried about, like, am I going to live?” the child questioned. “Am I going to make it out of here?
After his gun jammed, Card moved on to Schemengees Bar and Grill, where he unloaded his weapon on more unsuspecting victims.
“Every person thinks that something like this won’t come to their community, and I was of that mindset for a long time. But I think this just shows that it doesn’t matter where you are at,” Moore said about the mass shooting in Maine.
“We have to figure out how to stop it from happening. And the problem is that it’s happening way too often,” he concluded.
A manhunt is currently underway for the “armed and dangerous” shooter, as cites and towns in a 50 mile radius have closed down schools, grocery stores, and other public gathering places until he is found.
