Two Native men from Canada tell their stories of the mass shooting in Las Vegas
“Are those people dead?” Jode Kechego asked a security guard October 1 on the roof of the Mandalay Bay Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas after Nevada resident Stephen Paddock opened fire on a country music festival, killing 58 people and wounding 546 more.
Kechego was numb with disbelief after witnessing the tragedy. A member of Chippewa First Nation in Ontario, he was on the roof taking pictures of the Vegas skyline that night when the bullets began to rain down on the crowd. It wasn’t until later that evening Kechego realized he’d just witnessed the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history.
The echoes and bursts of rifle fire were bouncing off surrounding buildings – then the noise came to a halt. Everyone below ran to the centre of the Route 91 Harvest venue, but after a pause the shots rang out again while people fell running for cover.
The screams of horror reached Kechego back on the roof. Finally, police sirens came faintly over blasts. “Stay put, the shooter is in Mandalay Bay, only a few floors below you,” a friend cautioned Kechego through a text message.
The security guard then ordered Kechego to pack up his cameras and tripods and to reenter the building. The two of them ran back to the dining room on the hotel roof.
Yelling “Get down, get down, get down,” a SWAT team busted in and ordered the 80 people in the dining room to lay on the floor and put their hands up. The floor was on lockdown until 7:30 am the next morning.
On the ground, what sounded like fireworks had the audience applauding and singing, but that cheer left some people confused. Jordan Bear, a Cree from Waskaganish, stood with his girlfriend next to the Neon Lounge, just metres away from the main stage. Those sounds became worrisome when flashing lights didn’t meet the noise in the sky.
“Stay down, stay down,” a spectator urged the crowd, just seconds after the first rounds hit. Bear knew those shots were coming from the sky as bullets bounced off the ground. He ran for cover near the lounge with his girlfriend. Bear could tell the shooter was reloading his gun, and that was a signal to run for his life. He and his girlfriend made what seemed like a long journey to the exit through the blood-soaked grounds, cries for help resonating in the background.
By the time they reached the rear wall of the venue, people were trampling each other in panic, trying to break down walls. Some were running to the McCarran International Airport for safety. Bear and his girlfriend made it back to their hotel at about 10:20 pm with bloodstains covering their shirts though neither was wounded. But they were numb with shock.
The Aftermath
Bear and his girlfriend were supposed to come with friends from the Cree Nation who backed out at the last minute. He was relieved to know that some of his friends wouldn’t be victims in the senseless tragedy. He messaged two other couples with them at the concert, discovering that they were safe in a restaurant during the lockdown. It took about a week for Bear to finally “shake things off” from the tragic event; his girlfriend had nightmares for four straight nights.
The next morning, Kechego went to retrieve his motorcycle near the concert venue, but police had blocked off the area as a crime scene. Trying again four days later, the hotel security guard recognized him from the roof. Both went to give the photographs he had taken that fateful night to the FBI and Las Vegas police. The pictures proved valuable as they were from the exact same angle of the shooter and are now part of the investigation.
Kechego, who has worked as a land claims negotiator and policy analyst for the Anishinabek Nation, had a lot on his mind after the shooting. He had moments of sorrow and felt the urge to cry, but he held back those tears for a while. He spoke to Gitche Manitou and asked to be with the people at the scene and to be with their families.
Kechego left Las Vegas for a ceremony of release with his friends at Black Mountain. There he cried for an hour. His remedy is simple, and that was to deal with the trauma right away, through ceremony.