as americans, we are united in grief and outrage. you will not break us. we are better people than this. good evening from orlando. i m lester holt and this is a special edition of dateline. at least 50 dead, 53 wounded, many of them in critical condition. the biggest mass shooting in american history, and says president obama. an act of terror. the gunman omar mateen, stormed a gay nightclub, armed with an assault style military nightclub, opened fire and left the dance floor covered in blood. his motive, pure rate. reporter: it was supposed to be a night of fun, letting your hair down, saturday night had become early sunday morning, the music loud and funky. this video posted on the internet from inside club pulse around 1:00 a.m. last call, last dance, latin theme night was wrapping up. a crowd of about 300 packed into orlando s popular gay nightclub. approximately 2:00 a.m., everything changed, the gunman holding an assault rifle encountered an offduty police of
didn t really move because they thought it was part of the music, because the music was so loud. and when it kept on going, i think everybody s instinct went to this is not music, this is gunshots. oh, my god, they re all shooting back and forth. patron joshua mcgill described what he saw and heard. it was like boom, boom, boom. were people screaming? people laying on the ground, taking cover. jumping the fence. i think the pension actually broke with people pushing on it to get out. there was just too many shots, bang, bang, bang, that s when you know chaos, it was just turmoil. patrons trapped inside began calling 911. four us still hiding, lights are off in club. cops are her thank you, i jumped out. there s people still hiding inside the closet, that the shooters don t know they re in there. the club managers managed to post this notice on their facebook page, everyone get out of pulse and keep running. if only they could. my son was in the nightclub what
the suspect s name is omar mateen, he lives in port st. lucie. something really horrible happened that happened to all of us. as americans, we are united in grief and outrage. you will not break us. we are better people than this. good evening from orlando. i m lester holt and this is a special edition of dateline. at least 50 dead, 53 wounded, many of them in critical condition. the biggest mass shooting in american history, and says president obama. an act of terror. the gunman omar mateen, stormed a gay nightclub, armed with an assault style military nightclub, opened fire and left the dance floor covered in blood. his motive, pure rate. reporter: it was supposed to be a night of fun, letting your hair down, saturday night had become early sunday morning, the music loud and funky. this video posted on the internet from inside club pulse around 1:00 a.m. last call, last dance, latin theme night was wrapping up. a crowd of about 300 packed into orlando s popula
something terrible happened that happened to all of us. as americans, we are united in grief, in outrage. you will fought break us. we are better people than this. good evening from orlando. i m lester holt and there is a special edition of date line. at least 50 dead, 53 wounded, many of them in critical condition. the deadliest mass shooting in american history and says president obama an act of terror. the gunman, omar mateen, stormed a packed gay nightclub, opened fire with an assault style military rifle and left the dance floor covered in blood. his motives, pure hate. here is thbz s dennis murphy with the latest. it was supposed to be a night of fun, letting your hair down. saturday night had become early sunday morning. the music, loud. this video, povertied at 1:00 a.m. last call, last dance. a crowd of about 300 packed into orlando s popular gay nightclub. at approximately 2:00 a.m., everything changed. the gun man, holding an assault rifle encountered an of
history, and the fbi is looking for ties to the islamic state. governor rick scott of florida is very clear on what kind of act he thinks it is. this is clearly an act of terrorism. it s sickening. it should make every american angry. peter ducey is live at the scene in orlando with the latest. peter? reporter: and the latest just in the last two minutes. i spoke to a state representative who has been in touch with some of the officials who have been inside pulse nightclub today, and this is hard to hear. but as all of these as many of the 50 dead clubgoers still lay there and notification of next of kin is in process, their cell phones are still ringing at this hour. so the shooting happened 12 hours ago. the investigation has begun, but as they take these bodies out of the nightclub, their cell phones are still ringing, and it s a lot of parents and brothers and sisters and friends trying and calling to get in touch with their loved ones. but obviously trying in vei