Residents of Uvalde, Texas, attended a prayer vigil Wednesday evening for the victims of a school shooting the day before. Video / AP
Students across the US are walking out of their classrooms in protest against the nation's notoriously lax gun laws as Americans reel from the latest shooting massacre.
On Tuesday, gunman Salvador Ramos entered a classroom at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, armed with military-grade weapons and accessories he had been able to purchase legally the week before – just days after his 18th birthday.
He then opened fire on terrified children and teachers, killing 19 children aged between seven and 10 and two staff members, in what has emerged as America's deadliest school shooting since Sandy Hook in 2012.
Crosses with the names of Tuesday's shooting victims are placed outside Robb Elementary School in Uvalde. Photo / AP
On Thursday, thousands of students, fed up with empty "thoughts and prayers" from leaders and politicians, walked out of classrooms across the country as part of a nationwide protest.
The action was planned by Students Demand Action, an organisation dedicated to ending gun violence, with more than 200 individual protests carried out already and with more to come on June 3, which is National Gun Violence Awareness Day.
Two days after the Uvalde shooting, students at Oxford High School in Michigan – which was rocked by its own school shooting last November in which four students died – walked out in their powerful act of defiance.
HAPPENING NOW: Students at Whitefish Bay High School are participating in a walkout protesting gun violence in schools. @CBS58pic.twitter.com/HaeOldRQCC
Similar scenes played out at Saugus High School in Santa Clarita, California, where two students died in a shooting in November 2019, while protests were also seen at Whitefish Bay High School in Wisconsin, and Paul D. Schreiber Senior High School in Port Washington.
Another poignant protest was held at a school in Falls Church, Virginia, with dozens of students lying down on a running track to represent the children lost to gun violence.
Speaking to America's ABC News, Emma Janoff, a Year 11 student at Paul D. Schreiber Senior High School, said young people were frustrated by the government's inaction when it came to gun control.
"You see news every day about kids getting shot and people your age dying and it's just incredibly sad and unbelievable, especially to see like kids younger and kids my age," she told ABC News.
"I can't imagine that being me; but it is imaginable because it happens so often."
The 17-year-old, who is also a member of Students Demand Action, said students were "united" in the fight for safety.
Americans are reeling from the tragedy. Photo / Getty Images
A woman reacts as she pays her respects at a memorial site for the victims killed in this week's elementary school shooting in Uvalde, Texas. Photo / AP
According to the Students Demand Action, so far this year, and not including the Uvalde shooting, "there have been at least 77 incidents of gunfire on school grounds, resulting in 14 deaths and 45 injuries nationally".
"Six of these incidents took place in Texas," the organisation said.
A woman holds up a banner at the end of a vigil to stand with the Uvalde families and demand to end gun violence in Newtown, scene of the Sandy Hook massacre. Photo / AP
"We won't accept a country where gunfire can ring out at any moment, whether it's while grocery shopping at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, a party in San Bernardino, or graduations across the country."
