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Canada school shooting: 10 dead after a female gunman attacks Tumbler Ridge Secondary School in British Columbia, shocking the nation.

Ten people are dead. Nine victims. One shooter. A quiet Canadian mountain town has been shaken to its foundation and the entire country is in mourning.

A mass shooting at Tumbler Ridge Secondary School in British Columbia on Tuesday left nine people dead and the attacker a female identified by police officers also dead, in what appears to have been a self-inflicted wound. It now ranks among the deadliest mass shooting events in Canadian history.

Tumbler Ridge is not a place associated with violence. Sitting in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains in northern British Columbia, roughly 1,155 kilometres northeast of Vancouver, the town is home to just about 2,400 people. Snow-covered streets, tall pine trees, and a community where almost everyone knows each other.

But unfortunately, Tuesday changed everything.

Six bodies were found inside the school. Two more were discovered at a nearby residence believed to be connected to the attack. A ninth victim died before reaching the hospital.

At least two people were hospitalised with serious, life-threatening injuries. Up to 25 others were treated for wounds that were not considered life-threatening.

Local RCMP officers arrived at the scene within two minutes of the emergency call, a swift response that authorities say likely prevented even more deaths.

Police described the suspect as a female, dressed in a dress with brown hair. The shooter was found dead inside the school building, with authorities believing it to be a self-inflicted wound. Police Superintendent Ken Floyd confirmed at a press conference that the individual found dead matched the description in the earlier active shooter alert.

In North America, mass shootings are almost always carried out by men. This development has left investigators and the public deeply unsettled.

Police have not yet confirmed the identities of any victims or disclosed how many were minors. The school caters to students in grades seven through twelve, ages roughly 12 to 18 with a total enrolment of about 160 students.

Tumbler Ridge Secondary School will remain closed for the rest of the week. School officials confirmed that counselling services will be made available to students, families, and staff who need support during this difficult time.

British Columbia Premier David Eby struggled to find words. "It's hard to know what to say on a night like tonight," he told reporters. "It's the kind of thing that feels like it happens in other places not close to home."

British Columbia's Public Safety Minister Nina Krieger noted the speed of the local police response. "This is a small, tight-knit community with a small RCMP detachment who responded in two minutes, no doubt saving lives today," she said.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney described the shooting as devastating and offered his deepest condolences to the families of those lost. He cancelled a planned announcement in Halifax and postponed a trip to Germany for the Munich Security Conference.

"I am devastated by today's horrific shootings in Tumbler Ridge," Carney wrote on X.

Canada has experienced mass shootings before, but they remain far rarer than in the United States.

In April 2020, a gunman disguised as a police officer killed 22 people across Nova Scotia in a 13-hour killing spree before being shot dead by police. Before that, in December 1989, a gunman stormed Ecole Polytechnique in Montreal and killed 14 female students before taking his own life, Canada's worst school shooting on record.

Tuesday's Tumbler Ridge attack now takes its place alongside those tragedies in the country's painful history.

Canada maintains stricter firearms regulations than the United States. Citizens must obtain a licence to own a gun, and the government under former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tightened restrictions on handguns and assault-style weapons following the 2020 Nova Scotia attack. A further proposed ban on certain rifles and shotguns was later dropped after opposition from farmers and hunters.