When he arrived, he heard no shots. While he was investigating, Officer Brenna Hosi arrived to back him up.
“As soon as he got out of the car, the RVA started announcing,” three-year-old Pte Lulele of the Nashville Police Force told reporters Sunday. “Somewhere somewhere, don’t give me an exact quote, but, ‘There’s a big bomb inside this vehicle. Your primary goal is to evacuate. ”
He said, “I didn’t confirm what I heard, so I looked at Officer Hussein to verify what I heard.” “And then it started.”
After a while, that RV will explode and knock Lulen off its feet, damaging dozens of businesses. And three people were injured – but Nashville officials did not go home to evacuate nearby residents.
At a news conference on Sunday, five of those six officers gave first accounts of what they saw and what they experienced that morning – the creepy messages transmitted by the RV and their efforts to save lives, the shock of the blast and the fear for their fellow officers.
“This will keep us together forever,” said Fisher Wells.
‘We are moving as fast as we can’
After RV’s message began to play, Lulele said he instructed the sergeant. Miller, who told everyone to get out of there. Lulen requested all available units.
“From the tone of his voice, we knew he was serious,” said Wells, who was with Topping.
“Knowing that the RV vehicle was the vehicle in question, we got there as quickly as possible,” he said. “At the time, we really pulled straight in front of him.”
Officers arrived at the scene and waited for the bomb squad to arrive, while Sipoz and Hosi went inside an apartment building and knocked on the door. Sergeant. Miller also arrived and told officers to move their vehicles to a more strategic position before they go door-to-door and join others. Meanwhile, toppings remained on the street to keep pedestrians away.
“Knocking on the door between me and all the other officers, I think we contacted six or seven families,” Sipoz said.
Soon, RV’s message changed to a countdown, announcing that the vehicle would explode.
“At the moment when we hear the announcement of the explosion for 14 minutes, we are moving as fast as possible,” Hussey said.
After first clearing the building, officers began moving south, Sipoz said. They built it in another apartment building but did not contact anyone inside.
Lule informed him that once again, the RV message had changed and he was now playing a song. He said an ATF agent later helped identify him as “downtown” by Petula Clark.
Officials said that soon, that changed again. The blast was three minutes away.
‘I literally listen to God’
The RV had all its windows covered, said Lullen, who searched outside for a license plate but found none. At one point, Wells said he saw a camera over the mirror on the back of the RV.
“It felt like everyone behind him was watching,” he said. “It felt weird to me. All you cop lingo that you hear about the spide sense, the hair standing on the back of your neck. It passed through my body.”
Wells went back to his vehicle to get the heavy plates for extra protection. As he started to turn back to the RV, he said, “When I go back to God and check on the topping.
The topping was also moving in the other direction, but he said something told him to change direction and move to Wales.
Then, he said, “I saw the biggest flames I saw, the biggest explosion. I just saw orange and … felt the heat, the wave.”
“I will never forget the shattered windows around me,” he said. “It looked like a big prop from a kind of movie scene, all the glass shattered at once.”
Lullen, who had just told a man to walk to get his dog to safety, was knocked to the ground by the blast. Sipoz, who was getting equipment from his patrol car, was thrown into his trunk. Hussey was thrown forward, but he grabbed himself.
The topping ran straight to Wales. They grabbed each other and entered a door for safety.
“I was so scared I lost my full detail.”
‘Christmas will never be the same’
Everyone is fine, although Wells suffered a brief hearing loss in one of his ears, he said. Paramedics wanted to take him to the hospital, but when he heard that three people were injured, he said, he told them to take the injured.
But there was still work to be done.
Lullen, meanwhile, examined his fellow officers and, before running toward the debris, examined the man with his dog. He saw four more people exiting the building, officers who initially could not be reached, and told them to leave the area.
“I was just trying to make sure all our people were OK, and then they were leaving,” Hussey said. She focused her attention on protecting anyone who had not left the blast area or returning.
“We only spent time with outsiders as well as pedestrians … keeping them out of the area,” Sipoz said.
But after his experience, Wells said he considers himself lucky to be alive, but also committed to his colleagues.
“The love for them is bigger now,” Wells said of his fellow officers. “Christmas will never be the same for us.”
.
