NASHVILLE, Tenn. — For the first time, we're hearing from officers credited with confronting and killing a school shooter in Nashville.
Last Monday, surveillance video shows Audrey Hale opened fire at The Covenant School in Nashville, killing three 9-year-old students and three adults.
Once Metro Nashville Police officers entered the school, it took roughly three minutes and 30 seconds to find and kill Hale.
Officer Rex Engelbert, Detective Michael Collazo and Detective Sgt. Jeff Matheswere some of the first to arrive on the scene.
Just over a week after the shooting, the officers who responded to the scene shared their first-hand experiences for the first time.
Engelbert is not normally assigned to the area of the school, but he said he decided that day to go complete "administrative" activities at the police headquarters.
That was before the call about the shooting came in.
"I really had no business being where I was. I think you can call it fate or God or whatever you want, but I can't count on both my hands the irregularities that put me in that position," Engelbert said.
Engelbert said he never worked with the officers he went into the school with but knew through all their training what needed to be done.
The Metro Nashville Police Department also credited the school for its training in an active shooting.
"Their efforts also saved lives. They knew how to have the kids on the wall, away from the windows, out of the hallways. Where we could have had a lot more casualties, they were able to protect these kids as well," MNPD Chief John Drake said.
A community continues to struggle to make sense of this tragedy. Nashville's chief of police said he's attended the funeral of 5 of the 6 victims' funerals and said the sixth funeral is tomorrow.