US killings: 30 people killed by gunmen in less than 24 hours in Ohio and Texas

Nine people have been killed after a shooter armed with an automatic rifle opened fire at a bar in Ohio, making it the second mass shooting in less than 24 hours in the US after 20 people were killed in a Walmart store in Texas.

Police confirmed 10 people including the shooter were dead after witnesses heard gunfire and saw bar patrons sprinting away in the city of Dayton just after 1am local time.

Multiple people were shot, with medics reporting critical patients in the area of East 5th Street in the Oregon District. A total of 16 people have been taken to Miami Valley Hospital, but their ages and the extent of their injuries remain unknown.

The shooting unfolded at The Ned Peppers Bar in the arts and entertainment district of Oregon.

In a press conference, Mayor Nan Whaley told reporters: 

The gunman was wearing body armour and a had a 223 calibre high capacity magazines and extra magazines. 26 have been injured, there were 10 fatalities in our community including the shooter.

Mayor Whaley praised Dayton police, saying: 

If she hadn’t got to the shooter within a minute, hundreds could be dead now. The quickness of Dayton police saved literally hundreds of lives.

She added: 

Why does Dayton have to be the 250th mass shooting this year?

Witnesses said they saw a man dressed in black open fire with an automatic rifle, hitting up to 20 people. One witness said he heard “40 or 50” shots being fired.

The incident comes less than 24 hours after at least 20 people were killed in a mass shooting in El Paso, Texas, and less than a week after a gunman opened fire at a garlic festival in California, killing three people.

A man armed with a rifle opened fire at a Walmart store in El Paso, Texas, on Saturday, killing 20 people and wounding 26 others as panicked shoppers and employees scurried for cover before the gunman surrendered to police at the scene.

Many shoppers in the busy store were buying back-to-school supplies when they found themselves caught up in the latest mass shooting to rock the United States, just six days after a teenage gunman killed three people at a summer food festival in Northern California.

Saturday’s suspect was officially identified as a 21-year-old white male from Allen, Texas, a Dallas suburb some 650 miles (1,046 km) east of El Paso, which lies along the Rio Grande, across the U.S.-Mexico border from Ciudad Juarez.