Authorities have charged 17-year-old Dimitrios Pagourtzis, a junior at the high school, in connection with the shootings.

Pagourtzis, who was being held Friday at the Galveston County Jail on a capital murder charge and a charge of aggravated assault of a peace officer charge, also had explosive devices, including a Molotov cocktail, which authorities found in the school and nearby, Abbott said.

Authorities Friday had reported 10 people killed in the shooting, the majority students, but school district officials had not released names of the victims by early evening. Another 10 were reported to have been wounded, but a tally of people treated at area hospitals came to 14.

Students described a scene of horror and chaos during which many had scrambled to get out of the school and escape the gunshots they’d heard.

News of the unfolding horror broke at 8:12 a.m., when the school district had posted to social media the high school was on lockdown because of an active shooter.

DETAILS STILL SCARCE

Throughout much of the day, details of the encounter from law enforcement were scarce. But officials described a scene in which Santa Fe school district police officer, John Barnes, had been shot while attempting to bring the shooter into custody. There had been at least two school district police officers in the school when the shooting began, officials said.

In the morning and early afternoon, parents and students met in tearful reunions along state Highway 6 and at a school district building set up as a reunification center.

Worried families posted to social media searching for their missing loved ones and the community searched for answers in what Abbott called “one of the most heinous attacks that we’ve ever seen in the history of Texas schools.”

By mid-afternoon, many of the state’s top elected officials and law enforcement officers from all branches around Houston had descended on Santa Fe. Law enforcement had searched the school and residence of the suspected shooter, where they found explosive materials and journals detailing his intent to shoot up the school, Abbott said.

He had also described a desire to commit suicide before being caught by police, he said.

“He gave himself up,” Abbott said. “He didn’t have the courage to commit suicide.”

‘RUN, GO AS FAST AS YOU CAN’

Dakota Shrader, a 10th-grader at Santa Fe High School, was in her first period class when a fire alarm went off, she said. She then heard three loud “booms” and shouts from classmates to run, she said.

“The next thing we hear is boom, boom, boom,” Shrader said. “Everybody started running, just yelling ‘run, go as fast as you can.’”

Shrader, along with a classmate, took off down a hallway and escaped to a field near the high school, she said. There, she started to have an asthma attack in the midst of the chaos, she said.

She learned in a text message that her friend had been shot in the leg during art class, where students said the shooting began. Her friend was getting treatment at a nearby hospital, but she knew little about her condition, she said.

“I shouldn’t be going through this,” Shrader said. “It’s my school. This is my daily life. I shouldn’t have to feel like that.”

Susan Davidson, Shrader’s mother, didn’t know what to think when she got the frantic call from her daughter, she said. She was weeping into the phone and Davidson at first thought there might have been a fire or some other emergency, she said.

“She calls me in distress, there’s just noises coming out of her body,” Davidson said.

She pieced together that her daughter was in a field near the school. She rushed to the school, eventually meeting her near the high school, she said.

“I don’t know what to think — it’s traumatic,” Davidson said.

Like Davidson, other parents had started getting panicked calls from their children and others, and many dashed to state Highway 6, the main road near the high school, attempting to pick up their children.

Shirley Beazley walked along the side of the highway, asking passing law enforcement officers about the status of her son, Trenton. Trenton Beazley had been stuck in the high school’s field house with a bruised back and slight injuries, she said.

“I just want my son back in my possession,” she said through tears.

Other parents stood in shock as they took in the horrors of the morning coming across news and social media feeds.

“I didn’t think this could happen in a small town like Santa Fe,” said Lisa Johnson, a parent of two junior high students who lives near the high school. “That’s why I moved here.”

PANIC, CHAOS

Sean Mead had just gotten out of bed when his high school-aged son and four friends arrived to his house in a panic, he said. His son was in art class when the shooter opened fire in the classroom, he said.

The shots had shattered glass in the room’s window and his son, along with four friends, had leapt out the window and started running the mile to his house, he said. They had cuts from the glass and were crying and out of breath, Mead said.

“He didn’t see the shooter, but smelled gun powder,” Mead said. “It’s awful. I don’t know how to say it or explain it. The kids came in in a panic, in tears. I was in awe.”

By 9 a.m., police had put up barricades on state Highway 6 near FM 1764 blocking traffic to the high school and the school district was bringing in buses to haul high school students to Alamo Gym, 13306 state Highway 6, where they opened a center to reunite students and family.

The FBI — the agency eventually tasked with heading the investigation — shut down areas surrounding the high school until further notice as the agency and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms combed the premises with SWAT teams, bomb technicians, police dogs and evidence response teams, the agency said.

Late in the afternoon, the school district announced that high school classes would be canceled at least through Wednesday. Hundreds of people had gathered in the community to mourn the tragedy and the known and as of yet unknown victims.

“All I can do is pray for them,” County Judge Mark Henry said. “I’m going home to see my daughters right now, and I hope that’s what everyone is going to do tonight who can.”