3, including shooter, killed at high school hockey game in Rhode Island

Gunfire erupted at an ice-skating rink in Pawtucket, Rhode Island,during a high school hockey game Monday, leaving three people dead, including the shooter, authorities said.

The shooting, which happened around 2:30 p.m. at the Dennis M. Lynch Arena, left three other people in serious condition.

A motive for the shooting was not known, though it appeared to arise from a family dispute, Chief Tina Goncalves of the Pawtucket Police Department said at a news conference.

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The two people killed appeared to be adults, according to Goncalves.

The two teams set to compete Monday, Blackstone Valley Schools and Coventry Public Schools, were made up of players from multiple area schools.

"It was a senior night, a time for them to celebrate and remember," Goncalves said. "And it's very unfortunate that this happened today."

Law enforcement officials said that they would work with the schools to offer counseling services for the students who escaped the shooting.

"Obviously, you know, it's going to all settle in probably later tonight or tomorrow for them," Goncalves said.

As one of the teams was trying to break out of its defensive zone with the puck, a burst of gunfire echoed inside the arena, a video stream of the game showed.

Players on the benches began ducking for cover behind the boards. On the ice, the referee blew his whistle to stop the game and skated off the ice.

Within seconds, the benches emptied, with the teams hopping over the boards and skating toward exits on the other side of the rink.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Firearms, Tobacco and Explosives said on social media that it was sending agents to the scene of the shooting. Police in Providence said they sent officers to the scene to provide help.

Don Cowart, superintendent of the Coventry Public School District, said in a statement Monday that all students on the hockey team who were at the rink during the shooting were safe and had been accounted for.

"An officer from the Coventry Police Department is on scene and remains with the students," Cowart said. "We are grateful for the swift response of first responders and arena personnel."

Rep. Gabe Amo, D-R.I., who grew up in Pawtucket, urged people in a post on the social media platform X to avoid the area of the shooting.

"My thoughts are with the victims of the shooting in Pawtucket," Amo wrote. "Grateful to our law enforcement and first responders for acting swiftly."

The Providence Bruins, the American Hockey League affiliate of the Boston Bruins, offered its support to the community and praised emergency responders on social media.

The shooting comes about two months after Rhode Island was rattled by a separate attack at Brown University that killed two students, wounded nine others, and set off a dayslong search.

Investigators said the assailant in that attack also killed an MIT professor before fatally shooting himself inside a storage facility in Salem, New Hampshire.