A shooting rampage by a 17-year-old former student that has left at least 10 dead at a school in Winnenden, Germany is the latest in a series of attacks in education institutions. Here some of the major incidents.
September 23, 2008: Seinajoki University of Applied Sciences, Kauhajoki, Finland. Student Matti Juhani Saari, 22, killed 10 people before shooting himself in the head. Saari, who had been armed with a semi-automatic pistol and Molotov cocktails, posted YouTube videos of himself firing weapons before embarking on the massacre. November 7, 2007: Jokela High School, Tuusula, Finland. Pekka-Eric Auvinen, 18, killed seven fellow students and the school’s principal before shooting himself in the head. Auvinen posted a YouTube video titled “Jokela High School Massacre” before the killing spree. In it he warned that he planned to “eliminate all who I see unfit.” Brandishing a shotgun, the teenager was seen in the video wearing a T-shirt proclaiming “Humanity is Overrated.” April 16, 2007: Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, Virginia. Student gunman Seung-Hui Cho killed 32 people in the United States’ worst-ever campus shooting incident. Cho, who had a history of anxiety disorders, sent a video recordings of himself, armed with pistols before embarking on the attack which culminated in him taking his own life. His victims included five faculty members and 27 students. April 26, 2002: Johann Gutenberg Gymnasium, Erfurt, Germany. Expelled student Robert Steinhauser, 19, shot and killed 13 teachers, two fellow pupils and a police officer before committing suicide. Steinhauser dressed himself in a black ninja-style outfit before embarking on the massacre with a handgun and pump-action gun, seeking out adults and then gunning them down.
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April 20, 1999: Columbine High School, Colorado. Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold killed 12 fellow students and a teacher. The reason behind the massacre by the self-styled “Trench Coat Mafia” remains unknown although some have speculated the pair was railing against high school “jocks” that had persecuted them. March 13, 1996: Dunblane School, Scotland. Unemployed former scoutmaster Thomas Hamilton, 43, opened fire on a school gymnasium full of five and six year olds before turning the gun on himself. Sixteen children and their teacher were killed. It was claimed after the attack that Hamilton, who had been armed with pistols and revolvers, was a suspected pedophile, but the exact motive remains unknown. December 6, 1989: Ecole Polytechnique, Montreal, Canada. Marc Lepine, 25, killed 14 people and injured a further 14, with a semi-automatic rifle and a hunting knife before taking his own life. Levine claimed he was “fighting feminism,” targeting female victims. August 1, 1966: University of Texas, Austin, Texas. Student Charles Whitman killed his wife and mother before embarking on a shooting spree around the University of Texas clock tower. Whitman, 25, killed three people in the tower then a further 10 from the tower’s observation deck before police shot him dead. His actions were blamed on narcotics abuse coupled with health, family and legal problems. June 11, 1964: Volkhoven elementary school, Cologne, Germany. On his 42nd birthday, diagnosed schizophrenic Walter Seifert killed eight students and two teachers using a lance and flamethrower before taking his own life by swallowing insecticide. Seifart, whose wife had recently died of tuberculosis, reportedly shouted “I am Adolf Hitler the second” during his attack.
