"It's absolutely horrific. It's unlike anything I've seen in my entire life," said Broward Schools Superintendent Robert W. Runcie regarding the Wednesday afternoon shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland. "You can't describe something like this to anyone."
He continued, "I just continue to think about the parents and families that sent their kids to school and they did not return."
Just moments before the shooting, Runcie had handed the keys for a brand new Toyota Camry to Tammy Freeman, his school district's Teacher of the Year.
And then he got the news.
A shooting had taken place at a nearby high school. And just like that, the Broward Superintendent's day veered from triumph to tragedy.
"Today [Wednesday] has been a day of many mountains and valleys," he said. "There are numerous fatalities. It's a horrific situation. It's just a horrible day for us."
Runcie said Broward, the nation's sixth-largest school district, did not see the shooting coming what-so-ever.
"We didn't have any warnings, there weren't any phone calls or threats, that we know of, that were made," Runcie told reporters.
Several hours after his jubilant Teacher of the Year tweet, Runcie took to Twitter with a somber message.
Runcie is the Superintendent of Broward County Public Schools, the nation’s sixth largest public school district and the largest fully accredited district in the country, with nearly 270,000 students in more than 300 schools, education centers and charters.