EDITORIAL — Reason to worry

A 15-year-old student of the Catarman National High School in Barangay Dalakit, Northern Samar, was found carrying a gun to school last Thursday.

According to reports, a student reported to a teacher that his classmate had brought a gun to school. The teacher asked the 15-year-old to open his bag and found the gun, a .45 cal. pistol.

Aside from the gun, the student also brought four magazines and 10 .45 cal. rounds, although these weren’t loaded into a magazine for ready firing.

While the student admitted having brought the gun to school, he told the teacher, and later the police, that he had no plan to do anything with the gun.

Whether he was telling the truth or not, we can all heave a sigh of relief. At least this probable disaster was averted.

Had the student changed his mind, those 10 bullets could easily have meant 10 dead students.

Now the issue we can’t avoid; we are taking security for granted. How was he able to get the gun into the school past security?

It’s not just a matter of school security, but personal security as well. The student claimed the gun belonged to his father. How was the student able to get it? Wasn’t the gun secured safely at home?

Then there’s the matter of how his father got the gun. Police said the gun had no serial number, indicating that it was a loose firearm. Was it just ordered online? Or sold to him by an acquaintance, or an illegal firearms manufacturer?

Right now we are so afraid that another school shooting will happen. In fact, a loud noise at the Isulan National High School in Sultan Kudarat last Wednesday was mistaken for gunshots, causing a panic and temporary lockdown. The cause was later determined to have been electrical misuse.

As long as some parents can easily buy guns, as long as children can easily get to those guns, and as long as they can smuggle these guns into school we will always have reason to worry.