now fox news alert. we're following a developing story about shootings in chattanooga, tennessee. shootings at different locations. we're following that. this is very much a developing story. we hate to use the term fluid as it is a cliche john. it is a fluid situation. i'm jenna lee. we're taking what i believe -- is this a live shot of the -- tape. this is a tape of one of the highways. we're trying to work on the locations. the shootings happened off of two different highways in and

around the chattanooga area. >> were military personnel the targets here? we don't know. the u.s. navy is confirming that a shooting take place on the u.s. navy building in omnioga highway. chattanooga state university is on lockdown. an officer down. again, details are coming in. michael balboni, former homeland security adviser for new york state. we're fortunate to have his expertise now. michael, obviously just getting a handle on where the shootings have taken place and how many people might be down is proving tough at this moment. for law enforcement, what is job one here? >> job one is to manage the information as it comes in to be able to manage the resources, get the people where they need to be, particularly if this is an active shooter situation. one of the challenges one of the freaky things about every emergency that i've ever participated in is that the first reports seem to be always

inaccurate for some strange reason. that's why you have to take the time to make sure you get the right information. the challenge with an active shooter is you have to be able to isoce isolate the threat bring responses to the threat to make sure there's no other damage. because you don't know necessarily where the individual is that complicates the matter. >> and you mention individual. there appear to be at least two different shooting scenes which may be separated by as much as 30 miles. could this be some kind of a coordinated attack or is it one person in two locations? >> here's what we know about both al qaeda and isil. they want to attack the u.s. military. it's been part of their modus operandi. it's the way that they're recruiting people. they say they're more invincible than any other fighting force, particularly in the united states. we've seen fort hood shooting. we've seen other attempted shootings in new jersey so we've had issues back and forth with targeting military personnel. just recently we had a threat

over memorial day where it was warned that folks who were attending procedure ceremonies where there's uniformed personnel be conscious of counter surveillance what's going on around you, because we know that this is a value target for the enemy. >> we believe that one officer, one police officer has been struck by gunfire. it's not clear whether this was somebody who was responding to an attack or somebody who happened to be on the scene and a gunman decided to go after the officer, but there are several shootings reported at different locations. i imagine in the same way that we're trying to have trouble getting a handle on what's going on law enforcement has the same trouble, michael. probably the radio waves are jammed with all kinds of agencies there trying to figure out, get their arms around what's going on. >> so many different elements to

try and be able to know what's going on on a scene, particularly if you have different scenes itself. the top concern is always is this an active shooting that has been designed to be coordinated with others? do you have multiple sites? again, stretching resources. where do you send information? where do you send personnel? and what is really the top concern is getting the information correct, which is why i tell you at the beginning of these things yes, you need to have speed, but at the same time if you react, you over react, you send the wrong resources to the wrong places that could really have an impact on your ability to respond effectively. >> there are reports that some of the shooting has taken place at an army reserve center also reports of shootings at a navy reserve center. again, when you're in your line of work having been responsible for homeland security in the era of terrorism, that has to make you think twice about what we've got going on here. >> we know that isil in particular has been recruiting

worldwide. they've sent out the message, join the fight. come and help us go against the folks that would go against the caliphate we're trying to establish. they succeed if they get americans in particular who don't have any previous imprint on the counter terrorism system to go out and do these things because they're hard to attack. big, big concern since the boston marathon bombing obviously tensions have increased, and we've seen a lot more warnings lately about the potential of this happening. >> michael balboni, former new york state homeland security coordinator. michael, thank you, stick with us if you will. we'll continue on our different voices. a bunch of different great guests coming up on this breaking news story. want to recap what we know now which as we should mention is very little. it's easy for us to go as michael so rightly points out, here we've been put on a high alert about potential terrorist attacks and the targeting of military personnel.

we have no information that confirms any of that yet. in fact the description coming of the local press of the shooter, we give pause to know that first-hand accounts are normally inaccurate but i was listening to local news in the chattanooga area, and according to them the description of the shooter is a white male in a silver mustang. you heard from harris last hour shepherd smith as well. we've heard this report that this is the potentially the profile of the shooter but we have no confirmation of that. it does appear there are two locations. you have one location at a navy support center on amnicola highway in the chattanooga area. we have another report of a different shooting on lee highway. that according to local reporters, is at the armed forces center there. you see the city of chattanooga. one of the biggest cities in tennessee. population of just below 200,000 people. right now we know it's all hands

on deck to try to figure out what exactly is transpiring here. joining us fox news military analyst, navy man himself. captain nash as you see it again, a very much developing situation. what's your reaction to the news that we know so far? >> first and foremost the target that the shooter or shooters have chosen are out in the public. it's very different. they used to be called navy reserve centers, and then about ten years ago vice admiral john cotton renamed it as part of his overall structure to reorient the navy reserve from something that sat in the background in support and came more forward to operationally support the active duty services. so the navy reserve centers were renamed navy operation support centers. these things are not behind gates and guards as are our active duty forces. they're out in the public. that's their job to be out

there, be accessible and with that comes a certain amount of risk. so a shooter would decide to attack one of these targets, it's a much much softer target than would be an active duty one. >> to your point even though this is an armed forces career center the description of the neighborhood gives us an idea of what sort of a building this was. in this area where the armed forces career center was apparently targeted by the shooter, it's a retail area. there's a restaurant nearby. you can drive right up into the parking lot. and it's one -- it's like a little shopping mall for example, which fits your description, but that tells us something about the security that would or would not be there. >> right. and so if this is a shooter, shooters as mr. balboni was just describing to john where this could be perhaps, an isis-type inspired thing or if it's just

some nut job who maybe didn't get his benefits check and was turned away maybe because he's a little nuts or something like that you don't know what this is at this point, but i think what the police are probably trying to do is make sure that they cover all of the bases in case this is more than just a single nut job and, in fact maybe this is more that needs a morrow bust defense. >> all shades of evil on the table right now as far as wondering what is actually happening in chattanooga. there's a look live i believe at the area where the armed forces career center is off of lee highway. i believe that is the location -- one of the locations that we were just talking about as captain chuck nash just talked to us about. you can see the national guard. they signed there next to the restaurant as well and obviously the yellow tape cordoning off this area as the investigation is still very much ongoing. i just want to clarify something else that we've been reporting

on fox news over the last hour. we mentioned bradley scare mall in cleveland tennessee. bradley square mall has a national guard army recruiting office in the mall. this particular one. it's around chattanooga. at this point. captain nach right now, very little information we're expecting police to share what they know shortly. we're expecting to hear potentially more from the mayor out talking about this as is our understanding. the officer is down and in the hospital. >> right now the naval service

npis will get involved in this. the law enforcement recruiting center that you mentioned, jenna, will also bring in federal investigators. federal employees and their military. it's a local law enforcement situation. they are the ones that are doing a high speed drive to the next place and, again, this is not without precedent back to mr. balboni's statement. this is not without precedent. as you'll recall a couple of years ago, there were a couple of recruiters who were shot i believe it was in tennessee, maybe memphis, one was killed and the other was injured, so it's not the first time that someone associated with it with terrorism who wanted to be a

terrorist or terrorist wanna be has taken on a very open accessible vulnerable military location. >> no indication no confirmation that it is terrorism. the context, of course matters. the statements made by public officials it's so easy to understand why we can deduct these areas being targeted may have been targeted by those inspired by terrorism, but we don't know. captain nash you made that point earlier, too. you don't know just somebody that went crazy and we're getting some early reports, not enough that we feel comfortable with by the way, about injuries at the scene. we're working to confirm that. in the meantime the organizations and the businesses currently on lockdown include chattanooga state, erlg memorial hospital lee university so we're seeing more reports of different locals being put on lockdown. captain nash if you would stand

by we have more information and more guests to get to. >> u.s. senator lamar alexander is aware of the situation already out with a statement saying he's been in touch with federal, state, local officials monitoring it closely. the statement goes on from there. back to michael balboni, former new york city homeland security adviser for new york state. michael, the lockdown situation. you don't let anybody in you don't let anybody out, and you hope that the shooter is not already inside one of the buildings that's locked down? >> so the strategy obviously focuses on limiting the targets of opportunity for anybody who's in the active shooter mode so you make sure that obviously any type of soft targets like schools or malls are shut down. you obviously get a police presence there and establish a perimeter very very quickly. you are -- it's essential that you can get information from those areas so that you can get reporting should someone come on scene but, you know one of the

challenges also here is that every time something like this happens or a threat like this happens, folks in the security world sit there and say, is there more? could this be happening somewhere else? could this be a part of a coordinated effort to try to bring violence into america? and so that's one of the things that's going on and so i assure you what's going on right now is the net is being monitored. all sorts of calls are being monitored to see if there are other things that are out there and of course capture and apprehend this individual. >> jenna mentioned earlier the description of one person who is thought to be involved driving a silver mustang convertible. i mean if they're trying to be discrete and not noticed, that's not exactly the kind of vehicle you pick. >> it's impossible obviously, to tell what the motivations are as captain nash so rightly pointed out. we don't know the motivation of the shooter. could be a domestic violence issue. could be all sorts of different things but one of the key things i think captain nash pointed out was that these are soft targets. >> yes. >> this is not a military base

and, therefore, you begin to think, gee, if you wanted success, this might be a logical target for someone from a terrorist perspective. >> even as we've seen military bases like fort hood can proof to be soft targets in the worst of circumstances. thank you. we want to bring you the most updated information that we do have about the different buildings and locations in and around chattanooga that have been put in lockdown because of reports of an active shooter. we have the confirmation from the navy that a shooting did take place at one of their centers in and around chattanooga, tennessee. we have another shooting at the armed forces career center off of lee highway. i just got a word in my ear from the control room it's our understanding there is no longer an active shooter. what that means so far we're going to have to know. john -- >> there was one report that the shooter was down as well as a police officer so there may have been you know an exchange of

gunfire that took out the shooter but, again, these preliminary reports are just coming -- >> we're actually seeing some early reports of that. shepherd smith is standing by. shepherd you have some information for us as well? >> kind of do some housekeeping here. there were original reports, in fact from the local newspaper there, of radio traffic, police radio traffic that there might have been shootings at multiple recruiting centers in tennessee. turns out that's not true. then we talked about this bradley mall which was on lockdown and no longer is. we've spoken with the sheriff in that county who says there have been no shootings in his county whatsoever and that all of these lockdowns on which we've been reporting have largely been to err on the side of caution. what has happened is an initial shooting that happened there at a series of buildings that are connected together as it's been described to me at this naval center office buildings, not recruiting center but the navy the air force, other reserves

have different buildings that are connected together and, again, as is described to me the shooter got out of this convertible mustang and began firing with a large weapon is the best description i've been able to get of it and firing into multiple buildings one after another. whether he was running around doing so i'm not sure about. it sounded the way it was described to me is if he could have been able to do this from one position. and then he fled in this vehicle. now we know that an officer is down. we have that confirmed in many different ways including from the mayor. what we don't yet know is what that officer's condition is. they were intentionally vague as it's been described to me about what had happened to him. the large groups of police and fire at the hospital there would point to that officer being treated in that hospital and that officer's with us. there were early reports that the shooter was down as welling and then law enforcement sources would not confirm that to us. the mayor did not come out and

confirm that but there are indications now that this active shooting situation is no longer an active shooting situation. now does that tell us that the shooter is down? it's possible. but this is the location of the reserve center right there. it's just slightly north of chattanooga proper and so many places across chattanooga, missionary ridge, east and west of the city all have been on lockdown. i've now comfortable with that. the shooter may be on the run. the early indication is there is no longer a situation. we're waiting for a news conference. it was scheduled to begin at the top of the hour. best information i have is they were waiting for our law enforcement and federal authorities to be there for this news conference while trying to gather further information. the news conference will be of help to us.

the mayor's words were troubling, this horrific situation, and words still to come. since then there hasn't been anymore. authorities are still on scene in a lockdown where the shootings were said to happen. the number of cones around which normally mark where bullets fell or something of that nature. that's still an active investigative scene. aside from that it sounds as if the shootings themselves the fear that someone is on the run and might do this again may have passed as lockdowns are ending at places really across southeast tennessee. chattanooga is right on the border with georgia. if you look at the state of georgia, you can get to georgia within a matter of seconds or minutes at least so there were lockdowns happening. not far from the alabama border as well. there have been lockdowns on either side. the initial worry has passed. we have reason to believe that the shooter is down but to get

more specifics than that we're going to just have to wait for this news kochb for instance which we believe is minutes away. >> we are certainly hopeful that it is moments away. i know shep is quoting to us from these sources as well. the numbers are all over the place, that's why we don't feel comfortable going with any of them whether it's the injuries or the condition of the shooter at this time. again, according to the police department and one local report this is no longer an active situation as far as seven minutes ago according to that report. the bradley mall that we were talking about earlier where there were some concerns again, because the national guard recruiting office is there, is no longer on lock downas as well. as shep pointed out, there's a precaution on these locations that include the governor's mansion as well as the tennessee capitol. probably right now according to the local reports it looks like this is just out of an abundance of caution. shep if you would, i know you

were doing some earlier reporting about the suspect from your sources there. this story really has developed quickly over the past two hours. can you kind of walk us through the time line?ieve it was 10:50 a.m. local time there in chattanooga when the first reports came. again, we are not there. we're oo relying on local reporting. i've read everything i can read. this is how it comes together for us. the shooting happened with only vaguely what's described as a very large weapon. white guy in a silver or gray mustang, rag top. actually let's listen in here. breaking news from lee highway in chattanooga from some witnesses. >> then tried to go around back where i saw some people escaping from the back of the building to see if you know she would be coming out through the back. >> what was the scene like? >> it was -- it was a regular day. i mean he just pulled up and i didn't think anything of it. he had his drop top. he looked through the side and the next thing he lifted up his

arms like this with a big black gun. there was one shot and then it was just endless shots, one after another, just unloading into the armty. >> what was the scene like inside? >> just crazy. once we realized what was going on call 911, get to the back of the building. that was the only thing we thought of. just right now we're thinking thank god all of us are safe. it could have been us at any moment so we're just thankful right now. >> the whole scene is pretty much chaotic at this point. just what would you like to tell other people that are here and just kind of witnessing you know there's really the manager that he saw a man with a gunshot wound. >> we didn't see him but we heard that there -- >> well the feed has gone down but we're going to go back to that in a second. that's some of the first witness reporting we've been getting. while we were watching we got great news from the chattanooga free press. active situation is over.

this is the tweet from the chattanooga police department. active shooter situation is over. details coming. in addition to that off the highway there we have reports of a couple of gunshots heard. let me get to john glenn on this who just got it. two gunshots heard off the highway, is that right? >> according to a reporter named shelly bradbery with the charleston paper. just a few minutes ago. >> the chattanooga times free press? >> that's right. >> so two shots. that may explain the active shooter situation. our witnesses are talking again. let's listen. >> but like i said we're just thankful. we're just thankful for our hope and our faith and our trust in jesus that we're okay and that everyone in the complex is okay. >> last question. the families that have lost loved ones today? >> oh, just take one day at a time. love your loved ones. spend time with your family. if you're not born again, get

born again because you never know the day or the time. >> all right. and you heard it first. thank you guys so much for joining us. we really appreciate it. you guys stay safe out there. >> all right. thank you. >> once again, the owner and a client here at foil salon that heard everything. just to recap a little bit about what they said. they saw a silver mustang con convertible pull up. one of her clients saw a man get a big black gun and start shooting. police are still on scene carrying weapons around with them ready to go in case something else were to happen. josh and calvin of course we're going to be here. we're going to continue to follow this story and bring you any updates. >> thanks to our friends at news channel 9 wcvc in chattanooga giving us some live news there. we couldn't do it without our affiliates. we're positive now the police have confirmed that the active

shooter situation is over. so let's piece together what we know. we know an officer is down. the mayor has confirmed that. we know that officer is at a local hospital being treated. we know that we're waiting for more details on that. separately, we know the shooter is down and we know the active shooting situation is over. further we noah cording to the reporting of the chattanooga times free press, shots were heard off the side of the road. a couple of shots heard and law enforcement in the area at the time so i can't give you more context than that. i can't connect those dots. that's what i know at this moment. again, we're waiting for this news conference to begin. authorities are still certainly on scene where the shooting happened so much forensics to be done over the next few minutes and probably for the rest of the afternoon. but the lockdowns are ending one after the other. as the police have confirmed, there's no longer anything else to fear in and around chattanooga.

that part is over. the biggest questions are who is this person who's been described repeatedly in this silver rag top mustang who walked up to this area. clearly there's a salon next to t. it's a strip mall with some facilities for different branches of the service for reservists and the guy just started shooting him up. for us to -- the one thing we will not do is make a leap to somebody's targeting the military. it's way too early for that. it could very well be that this is domestic that this person was out to get somebody who works in one of those places or that this -- this person is just you know a mess in the head. we cannot know yet but we should know soon enough from authorities something about this man because, after all, he has been -- he has been stopped and so either we can presume now that either authorities have captured him or they have taken him down but either way, they would have been able to get a lot of information about the weapon from inside the car which

he was driving, on and on and on. and we're expecting to hear some of that shortly. we got word from washington that the fbi was involved which because this is a facility of an -- of an institution of the federal government is not at all surprising that the fbi would be involved. and you can see on the left-hand side of your screen there, much more calm sort of looking bunch of law enforcement officers and military folks as we've reached the point where the danger has passed. now we've got to find out what's happened and what the motives were. you can see armed forces career center. we've heard witnesses -- various witnesses talk about they've watched people work out there, fill out forms for the navy army air force reserves. they share buildings next door do a little training there. that it's a standard thing that people do there all the time. this morning a guy jumps from a vehicle and as it's been described to us repeatedly and by many just takes out this large black gun, i've heard four

or five people describe it that way now, and just start firing as the witnesses put it indiscriminately. the authorities may have more information than that and when we hear from them we'll take you there live, jenna. >> shep as you point out, we depend so heavily on our affiliates. the associated press, the wire service we know is quoting somebody that's giving us a little bit more information about what transpired around 11:00 in chattanooga, tennessee. this is coming by way of the spokesman of the u.s. army recruiting command center in fort knox kentucky. brian lefley telling the associated press, a u.s. spokesman with the u.s. army that a shooter stopped at the facility stopped and drove off. according to him this individual never exited the car, which does echo what we heard from some of the eye witnesses that were talking to the local station there. lefley goes on to tell the associated press the army

recruiters told him that they were not hurt that they had evacuated. he went on to say he had no more information for recruiters from other branches at the facility. as we're getting a little bit more information on this it looks like it's not just the one facility that perhaps it is now two facilities because that's what we've been hearing repeatedly all morning long. >> the navy is confirming that shots were fired at two separate facilities involving naval personnel. about eight miles apart. one on abnacola highway, the naval reserve operations center there, and also the naval recruiting center at 6219 lee highway. the director at military personnel. >> we just got new information confirmed by authorities on victims. we now know there are five victims. we know that four of those victims are military personnel. that's the only way they've been described to us. beyond that i cannot tell you.

we know that four of them are military personnel and one is a law enforcement officer. we do not know the condition of these victims, is that right, mark keiner. we do not know the condition of the victims. we're expecting to get this information. the only thing we know is about the law enforcement officer. >> one man was shot in the back of the leg and an officer had been shot somewhere. we were not given the detail of where this man was shot. we know the officer who is in the hospital is in stable condition so -- and these are not life threatening injuries or not expected to be life threatening injuries. the law enforcement officer who took a bullet at least one, is expected to survive this. is in stable condition at the hospital. as for the four military personnel, they would release that information separately. they would not give us an indication. the firing at the building we have multiple reports from witnesses of just one thing,

that is o shot in the back of the leg, but we now know that there are four military victims. so whether that happened inside the facility and the witnesses weren't aware of that information, we just simply don't know yet but, again, we're expecting a news conference in a moment. five victims in multiple locations in chattanooga, tennessee. john as the facts come together now, it's sounding more and more like this wasn't a domestic of some kind where someone would target someone who they had it out for. when you have four military personnel as they've described to us down and a police officer, it's starting to shape up as something else entirely. >> because this guy is out in a parking lot apparently shooting at buildings, let's hope it's something like window glass breaking. those bullets obviously going through the glass with a great deal of force and sometimes people are cut by flying glass. let's hope it is something like that. again, we're not getting new information or much more information than that from the military as to the four uniformed personnel who are down along with that police officer. again, all taking place in and

around chattanooga. 6219 lee highway. the amnacola highway naval reserves operations center attacked by what appears to be a lone gunman. it is said that the shooter is down and the threat to the people of chattanooga is over. >> as we continue to take in some live shots, this is the scene coming out of chattanooga, tennessee. although it's our understanding that active shooting is now over the investigation still very much in just its first stages. as we wanted to clarify to you, shep gave us that information that it's our understanding that there are some military personnel that are injured according to the report that we have received. we did by way of the associated press get word from the spokesman of the u.s. army recruiting center in fort knox kentucky that the army recruiters were able to get out and there were no injuries in that particular office but as we've been reporting the u.s. navy is saying there were shots

fired at their facility which, as we understand it cross over with the national guard and the army facility that we continue to reference, that's why it's a little bit confusing here. it looks like there are different branches of the military represented in a few key areas. joe caranelli is a former commander with the new york city police department. joe, again, beginning of this investigation. where do you look first? >> first of all, the shooter, whether he's down -- if he's down or if he's -- you know if he's wounded or if he's there, hopefully he's taken alive if he's taken at all. you have two locations, you have multiple victims that you're now reporting. you have to see the condition. like john said it could be flying glass or he might have waited until i saw uniforms and started spraying. also the officer, whether he was at the scene or description about the vehicle and that's

when he -- the encounter took place with the vehicle. it's still unfolding. they're not going to release any information, the police department and the military they'll take their time until they have all the facts in place, and also they don't want to disclose anything about the shooter until they know there's nobody else that he's associated with out there actively doing the same thing. >> we've been awaiting a news conference. stand by for us shep. those are the big questions out there, who and why. >> they are releasing some information. we've just gotten that police sources now tell us that this officer who was shot is stable in the hospital and a police lieutenant a local police lieutenant has taken his family to be with him at that hospital. they are all inside. many other authorities there as well. and the locals are asking for blood donations to deal with what has become a pretty intense situation. in addition local media reports are -- i mentioned there was one police officer who was involved here. we don't know whether from the city of chattanooga, from county

police we just don't have that specific yet, but we do know there's the one police officer. there are four members of the military. multiple local reports indicate the four injured from the military are marines. now that sounds a little weird because this is a navy center but, remember there are multiple offices there all connected to each other. one for the navy one for the marines, one for the air force as it's been described to me now, i haven't seen, this all the locals are describing it in this way. the members of the military who were hit in one way or another today, one we know in the back of the leg, were members -- were from the marine center which is right there. the chattanooga times free press has many different reporters on locations around this area and we now know there are two different shooting areas. judy walton is on the line with us. she's the assistant metro editor at the chattanooga times free press. judy anything to add to us from your reporting? >> well we're grateful this appears to be over. we are just now getting

confirmation that four marines were injured and that the shooter is dead. our reporter on the scene heard shots in the woods near the marine reserve center or the navy reserve center where those marines do their operational training at about 11:34 this morning, which was about 40 minutes after the initial call. we do not know whether that has anything to do with the death of the shooter or whether that's unrelated. >> but we do know that that's a scene for police at this moment as well? >> yes. yes. there is an army of police officers atf, fbi, terrorism -- joint terrorism task force, everybody else with a badge right now. it's just a major puzzle. >> again, judy walton, assistant editor at the chat tatanooga times free press. >> there are two location right, judy? >> yes, that's correct. >> could you describe those to us? >> the one on the amnacola

highway center where the marines were injured, it's a brick building, training building with garages out back. it's next to railroad tracks. there are woods around. it's right next to a major and very popular park called river park where families come to bring their families to play and fish in the tennessee river. it is right next door to -- separated only by a fence by the chattanooga community technical college which was on lockdown this morning, as was many other businesses in the area. the other site at the recruiting center on lee highway is a commercial strip mall in the intersection of state highway 153 and interstate 75. another populus area. we had one witness there who did not see the shootings but from a business heard a series of loud pops which he described as coming from an ar-15. he did not see anything.

>> marilyn hutch chin son said it was a rapid fire like pow, pow, pow, pow so quickly. the indication is not that he was targeting anything in particular but sort of the witnesses have said on that location correct me if i'm wrong, that he was firing at a series of buildings connected to one another within the strip mall right? >> i do not know that. i have not got information on that and have not spoken to the reporter about that but there is a long series of you know, connected small businesses like you would see in any strip mall there. >> my understanding is the mayor and the governor are apparently on the way and -- for this news conference and that the fbi is going to join as well. do you have reporting on that? >> our reporter is at the news conference that should have started a few minutes ago. jim cavanaugh who is the former head of the bureau of alcohol, tobacco and firearms in tennessee said that the joint terrorism task force was going to be on its way from knoxville and the defense department has investigators as well.

>> judy walton is assistant metro editor doing great reporting online right now if you want be to follow along. judy. thank you. jennifer griffin at the pentagon now with an update from a national level. jennifer? >> shepherd we've just been on the phone with the marine corps trying to confirm that four marines had been injured the at the amnacola location. that's the naval -- as you were discussing on the phone line. that's the location where this reserve office building is and that earlier today when we were talking to the navy, they said that there had been shots fired there but they could not confirm that there were any injuries. now it turns out according to your witnesses that you had on the line that there may be up to four marines who were injured at that amnacola location. it's important to point out that the second location and we do know that shots were fired at two locations, the one on lee highway, that is a recruiting center.

that is not where the marines were reportedly injured. at the recruiting center -- the reason this is confusing is several services the national guard as well as the army reserves as well as marines are located at that strip mall mall location on lee highway. we've seen the video that shows the door to that recruiting center was shot up by bullets, multiple bullets. we've seen the shattered glass. that's at the strip mall at 6219 lee highway in chattanooga. so it seems right now we cannot confirm but there are reports of four marines injured at that amnacola location, shepherd. >> we're working on a map. there's a glass company there and a woman named marilyn hutchinson was there and witnessed everything that happened apparently at the

amnacola location. she said i quote, i couldn't begin to tell you how many it was like pow, pow, pow, pow so quickly. the next thing i know police cars were coming from every direction. she ran inside where she remained locked down with other employees and the customer and the gunfire continued with occasional bursts she estimates for 20 mentsinutes. so at the amnacola location occasional bursts for up to 20 minutes again. quoting again we were apprehensive not knowing what transpired. it was a grievance, terrorist related, we don't know. they have athey've seen dozens of emergency vehicles. none of us know. this happened at two different locations. no one has suggested that there are two shooters not to me. have they to you, jennifer? >> no. we have not been able to confirm that there was more than one shooter. what we have confirmed is that

there were two locations, about 7 1/2 miles apart. it's not clear to me at this point took place. was it at the recruiting center on lee highway or at the amnacola center shepherd? >> we're not entirely certain because the witnesses are giving times that are very similar but that's because so often when breaking news happens and you're not used to seeing it happen in front of your eyes all kinds of things get kind of jumbled. one thing we're sure of is we have five victims, a police officer, four members we're pretty sure confirmed now, four members who are related in some way to the marines and now we're waiting to -- we know that the gunman is down. we don't know that the gunman has been killed but we believe that's what's happened. now we're waiting for more details from authorities. jennifer i recall a situation where multiple locations had been attacked in the same day,

not since this channel's been open. >> i can't think of one right now, shep right off the top of my head. what -- it is certainly there is precedence for recruiting centers having been shot at. something you said earlier, why would marines have been at a navy support center remember the marines do technically fall under the secretary of the navy so often you would find marines in a navy support operation center. they would be co-located there. so it would make sense that there were marines on the scene. but, again, i think right now we're going to have to wait for the press conference and see the mayor himself when he came out originally he was the one who reported that it was an awful scene and that the recruiting center had been shot. there's been confusion because the official tweets from the u.s. navy here and the pentagon there was some confusion. they ruled out a shooting at one location. they haven't been able to

confirm any injuries but, again, we're sitting here at the pentagon in washington and this is happening down in chattanooga. so we'll just have to wait for the press conference at this point. >> jennifer thanks. from the chattanooga times free press, one of the things we read today was radio traffic in every newsroom in every town across america, you monitor what the police are saying on the radios and they described multiple shootings at multiple places within a few minutes of each other at multiple military facilities. the original thinking was, well that can't be true because there was only one shooter. well now it appears that's exactly what happened and that the radio traffic reports were accurate. that at one of these locations there was shooting first. we know that the amnacola location the shooting went on for some 20 minutes off and on. we know that at some point he sped away from that location in the silver rag top and went to apparently one of the other locations and that five people

are injured and that the suspect is down. the news conference that was scheduled for 1:00 is 44 minutes late. i feel like the next good information will come from that news conference and as it begins we'll be back with you. >> shepherd smith, thank you. chet jenkins is a former u.s. army ranger and fbi agent. chad we were told i believe it was jennifer griffin who said agents from the joint terrorism task force are responding. does that necessarily mean this is terrorism or is that done out of an abundance of caution? chad? all right. we do -- chad jenkins, are you able to hear me. >> yes, sir. >> go ahead. >> yes. >> does this sound like a terrorist attack? is that why members of the joint terrorism task force are responding or is that simply a precaution? >> any time we have an active shooter scenario across the country the fbi is now going to

be involved however, how quickly they've come to this -- to this crime scene, if you will shows that they had a quick reaction to get there and i think all indications right now from the traffic that i've listened in to is some is lamg mick terrorism organization most likely inspired this type of attack. if we look back at carlos bledso attack. this follows the same mo and the islamic organization has called for inspired individuals to go ahead and attack military recruiting stations here. >> military recruiting stations are targets. again, we don't know this was any kind of islamic inspired terrorism. that answer is yet to be determined. it should be pointed out, you know many people might think that military service members are armed carrying their sidearms day and night. that's not the case. it's pretty unusual for all but

the mps to be carrying sidearms isn't it? >> well and look at the fort hood shootings. we've had two shootings that were mass casual at this situation cash situations. the presidential order took away the rights for service members to carry concealed and to protect themselves here on the homeland. we ask these men and women to go into harm's way overseas. we should allow them the constitutional rights to protect themselves on the homeland. >> chad jenkins, thank you very much. we've been quoting a woman, marilyn hutchinson who was in the area. she was in the naval reserve location or support center. marilyn is on the phone with us now. marilyn, before we get to what happened at 11:00, can you just describe for us where you work and where you were in relation to the shooting? >> we are -- i work for the glass company here in

chattanooga. we are directly across the street from the river park where the naval reserve office is located. >> so tell us what happened this morning? >> my friend and i were on a break and we were sitting outside. and, you know all of a sudden it was -- it was close to 11. we heard between 7 and 15 pops you know just pop, pop, pop just in rapid succession. and we looked at each other and we said that's gunfire. and the next thing we knew there were police officers coming from everywhere. and just shortly after they converged on the area for about 15 or 20 minutes there was just a heavy barrage of gunfire. >> and were you able to see anything marilyn? i understand you heard these shots. were you able to see anything if you were back in the office building? what could you -- what could you see from your vantage point? >> actually the way that the

demographics are of this area because the river park sits down you're actually above the level and it has a heavy tree line so unless you're in the park itself you can't actually see anything. you can only hear what was his a very busy area, marilyn, the navy reserve office? is this a place a lot of people are in and out of on a regular basis? >> it's a very busy area. it's an industrial area. we have the river park which is the river walk. you have a lot of tourists. you have a lot of local folks that use that area. they're busy all the time. >> it must have been pretty scary to hear that that >> it was shocking to say the least. and then when you heard the heavy barrage of gunfire after the police officers arrived, then you knew that there was something serious going on. and because we knew that that naval reserve was over there, that's the first thought that goes through your mind. >> so you heard the shots, marilyn. this is john scott talking to

you now. you heard the shots, but did you see anybody with a gun? >> no. and, you no he unless you were in the river park itself that's secluded area over there. so it would be very difficult for anyone to actually see an active shooter. >> right. in the woods. you said that the first barrage was, you estimated, seven to 15 shots but then the shooting went on for another 20 minutes after that. you think some of that was return fire coming from police officers or was that 20 minutes of extended shooting all from this gunman that you weren't able to see? >> i think it was a back and forth between the shooter and the law enforcement. >> where are you now, marilyn? >> i am still locked up in our building. >> has any law enforcement come by -- anybody called you to tell you -- just understanding that even though you were not able to see the reserve center you're

in fairly close proximity. very law enforcement come by? have you made contact with law enforcement? >> yes, ma'am. they're all over the place. they've been monitoring us and watching us and, you know they've done a terrific job. i mean these guys it's unbelievable at the safeguards that they've put into place. >> as of right now you're still not told to leave your office area. >> that's correct. there is still an ongoing investigation, so we cannot leave the area right now. >> there is a report that one officer was shot. apparently shot in the leg. is that something that took place near you, are you aware, or did that happen at one of the otherlocations? >> to my understanding, there was one officer that was shot and at least four of the military reserve guys i believe them to be marines, were also wounded, and no one knows their particular situation right now, what kind of physical situation

they're in. >> those are the same numbers that we have been reporting. must be a very frightening time for you and all of your co-workers. >> it's very frightening to know that it's that close to you. >> marilyn, we have been talking a lot, of course talking about some of the national headlines. there has been a big alert and homeland security nationwide investigations happening related to terrorism. we have no information, live on the air. we have no information about who the shooter is and why they've decided to shoot today at this very location. so there is a great unknown out there. but i am curious because you live in the community. have there been any reports of heightened security in the area or concerns from local law enforcement talking to citizens about, you know anything that they've wanted you to be aware of? >> not to my knowledge, there have not been any alerts or any heightened awareness of anything

like this. but when you look at what has happened you know with the two -- you know you had the navy -- the reserve office on lee highway was also attacked and then you look at this navy reserve that was attacked you can't help but think that it was terrorist related. i mean why else would anybody target the military? >> it's tough to know. >> your average criminal is not going to do that. >> right now it is so tough to know. quite frankly, we're just as frustrated as everybody else trying to figure out what happened here. i understand that the press conference that we're waiting on as well is going to be happening around 2:00. in another seven minutes or so. marilyn, do you have family in the area? are you from chattanooga originally? >> i am. >> talk to us a little bit about this happening in your hometown. what is going through your head right now? >> i mean you know this is a very tourist-oriented area. i mean you know things like

this you just don't -- you don't imagine them happening, okay. it's just -- it's frightening. >> well we're certainly thinking about you today. we saw your information through the wire service, and we're very grateful marilyn, that you were able to join us because we've been relying a lot on local reports, and you were one of the first people that we were able to talk to in the area. thank you very much for the time. wish you the best of luck. we'll be thinking about you and your work family and your family in chattanooga. beautiful city as it is. thank you, marilyn. >> thank you. bye-bye. >> the president is traveling out west at the moment. we understand from one of his national security personnel that he has been briefed on the security situation at the -- of the chattanooga shooting. he will continue to get updates as warranted. let's go back to michael balboni, a former homeland security leader for new york state. michael, during the time we have been away from you, have you

been able to get any updates from your sources or just looking at the whole picture, can you give us your feeling about what may have transpired there? >> i think marilyn said it right. when you take a look at the targeting of two different facilities that are military personnel and then you look at what isis has been saying out there on the web, and you also realize that since 2009 with the fort hood shooting there have been 17 separate attacks, in addition which plots have been targeting military personnel. at this point in time you don't want to speculate as to what the motivation is of anyone who does an act of violence like this but certainly you cannot count out terrorism. >> shooter -- as far as we know it appears to be one shooter involved in a couple of different locations, but the shooter, we believe, is down. all of the -- all of the authorities are saying that the incident is over. but just talking to marilyn, you know clearly the people in her office are still being sheltered

in place there by local authorities. it's going to take a while before some of those holds come off. >> you know what the local law enforcement investigators are doing right now, they're going to scrub this individual's life they're going to get to where he lives, they're going to try to find out whether or not there are any other weapons or any other type of munitions, ex closives employeesives. then a link analysis chart. who did he know or talk to? is there anybody else who facilitated this. that's where it expands out to try to find out who is involved in this if any other. >> obviously when they do make some of those -- when they connect some of those dots i guess you would say, they're going to find in all likelihood that this guy may have posted something online or may that ranted about his dislike for whoever his targets were today. >> you're obviously going to take a look at his travel, where

has he been? has he received any training? is there any type of direct connection with radical elements. that's what they'll be looking at. the big thing is is there anybody else out there who has a similar type of motivations that they've got to watch right now. >> michael balboni. former chief of homeland security for the state of new york. thank you for your expertise. >> thank you. a few hours into this. we are awaiting the press conference coming from the local police department in chattanooga. as of right now this will be the first time that we've heard directly from the mayor since earlier today when according to local reports, he rushed through what was a news conference that seems that it was previously scheduled to try to find out more information about what exactly transpired in his own city. around 11:00, it's our understanding that there were -- that's when one of shootings started. that would be at the navy support center off of amnicola highway. and that there is also another shooting that took place on lee

highway, at what has been described as the armed forces career center. it's our understanding, as you can see by some of the video that we have that this is an area where a few different military branches perhaps operate. strip malls, jon, easy to drive up to. according to eye witnesses as well as local reporting, the shooter, we don't have any indications at one of the locations that he even exited his vehicle. >> the police have put out a request for blood donations there in chattanooga on behalf of the one officer who was hurt and certainly also for those four marines who have been injured. we don't know the extent of their injuries at this point. you know the good people of chattanooga are certainly going to respond. our coverage now continues with shepard smith. he is on the news deck. gretchen carlson also is in place and continues our coverage. thank you, everybody, for joining us. "the real story" starts now. thanks so much jon and

jenna. shep we now have a witness on the phone as we continue our coverage of the shootings that have happened in chattanooga, tennessee, today. gena mule is a server at a restaurant that was put under lockdown. she is with me on the phone. gina are you there? >> yes, ma'am. >> we've been seeing in the video that we can see this restaurant that you worked at toscano, in the strip mall area. tell me what happened. >> i came in to work like a normal day. in the back cutting lemons. we normally get busy around that time. i heard loud noises. i walked to the front of the restaurant and looked out of our windows and i seen the guy in the car. all i could see, from the angle i was at -- i mean it was a silver drop-top mustang. and a huge gunpointing pointing out the window and he was opening fire on businesses next-door to us. >> he was shooting from still

inside his car. >> yes. >> okay. you say it was a big gun. it's being described in some of the reports as a high-powered rifle. did you get a good look at it? >> yeah. it wasn't like an assault rifle or nothing like that. it wasn't simultaneously fired but it was pow, pow, pow, one after another. >> we are looking at the restaurant you work in, right next-door to the military recruiting center. you're saying the shooter was active still inside the car. was he pulled up alongside the windows? >> pretty much. as close as a car can get, i guess, to the walkway. he was right in front of the business. >> once again we're seeing the restaurant you work in there. the recruiting center is to the left of that. right, gina? >> yeah. i guess from you guys' perspective, inside the restaurant there on the right. >> the shooter, in your estimation as you're witnessing this never gets out of the car at