Fox Sports national columnist Bill Reiter was also at the airport during the gunfire. “After the initial burst of gunfire and hiding, people started jumping over one another, jumping off chairs, pushing each other. Chaos & fear,” he said on his Twitter account.
The passengers were directed to board a bus and were taken to a smaller terminal, Perez told the affiliate.
Alex Neumann was at a food court, waiting to travel to Miami, when the incident unfolded. He said Terminal 2 was put into lockdown.
“People were running and people getting knocked down. There was luggage everywhere,” Neumann said. “Mayhem is the best I can describe it.”
Several police officers moved about the airport with guns drawn, he said. KCAL showed live video of three officers with rifles to their shoulders inspecting parked cars in an open-air parking lot.
The Los Angeles Fire Department was assisting with a “multi-patient” incident at Los Angeles International Airport, the department said Friday on Twitter.
Firefighters were laying tarps on the street at the airport, apparently for triage. Several ambulances were at the airport, and at least one person was loaded into one.
The area around the airport was jammed with cars as police shut down access to the airport Friday morning.
President Barack Obama has been briefed on the shooting and will continue to be updated, but the White House had no further information at this time on what happened, spokesman Jay Carney said Friday.
Authorities were interviewing about 100 witness, the intelligence source said.
A leader of the union representing TSA officers deplored the incident.
“We are sickened by reports of today’s shooting,” American Federation of Government Employees National President J. David Cox Sr. said.
CNN’s Casey Wian contributed to this report from LAX
Article Appeared @http://www.cnn.com/2013/11/01/us/lax-gunfire/index.html?hpt=hp_t1