™ & © 2021 Cable News Network, Inc., a WarnerMedia Company. This story has been updated with additional developments. Metro system’s eighth busiest station in this year with more than 2,400 passengers boarding each day, down from an average of 15,000 per day pre-pandemic. The Pentagon is serviced by dozens of bus routes and Metro’s blue and yellow rail lines. “We will continue to do so until we are advised it is safe,” WMATA spokesperson Sherri Ly told CNN. Metro trains and buses are now bypassing the area, according to the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority. The reported shooting has halted mass transit to the massive complex. Austin is staying away for now “out of respect” for the investigators needing to work. Pentagon officials “will cooperate fully with local and federal authorities” the official added. The area where the incident took place is “still very much an active scene” for investigators, the official said. We are forever grateful for that service and the courage with which it is rendered.” “This tragic death today is a stark reminder of the dangers they face and the sacrifices they make. “I have ordered to half-mast the flags flown on the Pentagon Reservation in honor of his loss,” it added. “On behalf of everyone working at the Pentagon, and across the Department of Defense, I extend my deepest sympathies to the family, loved ones and colleagues of the Pentagon Force Protection Officer who died as a result of injuries he received this morning,” the statement said. “He did have a chance to visit the Pentagon police operations center when he returned, to check in with them and to express his gratitude for everything they’re doing on this day with this particular incident,” said Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby.Īustin released a statement later Tuesday in which he offered condolences to the officer’s family but did not elaborate on the circumstances around his death. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, were attending a scheduled President’s Daily Brief and intelligence update meeting with President Joe Biden at the White House when the incident at the Pentagon occurred, according to a defense official.Īustin has since returned to the Pentagon and visited the Pentagon police operations center in the wake of the shooting outside the building, according to a Pentagon spokesperson. The status of the patients was not immediately provided.ĭefense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Gen. The bus platform is used by multiple bus lines in the area.Įarlier Tuesday, Pentagon Force Protection Agency spokesman Chris Layman would not comment on if there was a shooter involved or if people had been injured but Arlington Fire and EMS tweeted that they “did encounter multiple patients,” while responding to an “active violence incident” in the area of the Pentagon Metro. The event occurred outside the building on the Metro Bus platform, which is a major entrance to the Pentagon used by thousands of personnel every day entering and leaving the building. Corridor 3 is open for pedestrian traffic.” Corridor 2 and the Metro entrance remains closed. The lockdown has since been lifted, the agency announced later Tuesday, tweeting: “The Pentagon has lifted the lock down and has reopened. The “shooting event” occurred on the bus platform on the Pentagon complex and prompted a lockdown of the building with no personnel allowed outside, according to a message that was sent to the Pentagon workforce by the Pentagon Force Protection Agency.
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