Virginia Tech shooting updates

By Diane Silver

[Updated 2:46 p.m. CST]

The closest newspaper is the Roanoake Times.

[Updated 2:37 p.m. CST]

From my vantage point far away in Kansas, the best I can do is post the most helpful links I can find. At last count it appears that 32 people are dead.

The Poynter Institute has a roundup of coverage that's helpful. (At 2:42 pm, I just finished reviewing the Poynter roundup. This is extremely helpful and provides links to many local accounts and blogs I haven't seen anywhere else.) Poynter works with professional journalists.

Poynter has also created a list of resources for journalists. If you're not there interviewing people, this proabably won't be much help, but if you're blogging or writing about this, the articles on this page may provide prospective.

Meanwhile, my local school, the University of Kansas, is paying attention.

[Updated 12:24 p.m. with new sources. See bottom of post.]

My thoughts and prayers go out to the people at Virginia Tech University. This is breaking news. I have nothing more than what's on the web, although all sources are reporting that the shooter has been killed.

I do have one caution.

As a newspaper reporter, I covered many breaking stories, and the details always changed. Sometimes things we first thought were true, turned out not to be. Take a deep breath. If your religious, say a prayer for the folks involved directly with this tragedy.

All of these tragedies are horrible, but I guess this one shakes me up because I've spent most of my adult life work on or around college campuses.

Here is a link to the student newspaper at Virginia Tech. It's trying to cover this blog fashion, but is having server problems.

Here's CNN on the shootings.

A Daily Kos Kossack is on campus and is posting a diary on the shootings.