Updated on: April 18, 2025 / 8:51 AM EDT / CBS Miami
The air was thick with silence Thursday night and into Friday morning as Florida State University students stood shoulder to shoulder, their arms wrapped around each other in front of flickering candles and wilting flowers.
The growing memorial outside the Student Union stood as a fragile symbol of solidarity on a campus still reeling from tragedy.
Less than 24 hours earlier, gunfire had shattered the calm. Two men were killed and at least six others wounded in a shooting that erupted near the heart of campus, shaking the FSU community to its core.
The suspected gunman, 20-year-old student Phoenix Ikner — stepson of a Leon County sheriff’s deputy — was injured in a gunfire exchange with local authorities and remained hospitalized.
Vigil planned after FSU mass shooting
In the aftermath, grief and disbelief hung heavy over Tallahassee. Backpacks, glasses and notebooks were left abandoned inside the Student Union, where students had been studying and working on group projects before chaos unfolded.
By dawn Friday, those same students had begun reclaiming the space — not with fear, but with remembrance. Balloons, teddy bears and handwritten notes piled up at the makeshift memorial, now a place for quiet reflection.
A school-wide vigil was planned for the evening as FSU canceled classes through the end of the week and opened counseling services at the Askew Student Life Center.
“I graduate in two weeks,” one student said tearfully. “And never in my time here would I think this would happen.”
How some FSU students reacted when shots were heard
For Holden Mendez, a student who saw the shooter firsthand, the horror was immediate, but so was the instinct to protect others, he said.
“As soon as I thought I was in a somewhat safer position, I said, okay, I need to start getting people calling 911,” Mendez told CBS News Miami.
Another student described taking charge when her teacher, unfamiliar with active shooter protocols, froze. “She was from Canada,” the student said. “So the students and I kind of just took over to control the situation.”
What we know about the suspected shooter
The suspected shooter, Ikner, was reportedly a quiet and isolated student, according to classmates. Authorities said he used a handgun that belonged to his stepmother, a longtime law enforcement officer.
The shooting has reignited conversations around campus safety and gun control, coming as Florida lawmakers debate undoing parts of the gun reform legislation enacted after the 2018 Parkland massacre.
But on FSU’s campus, the focus for now is healing.
“We pray that something like this never happens again,” a student said through tears at the memorial. “But right now, we just need each other.”
Sergio CandidoSergio Candido is a managing editor for the South at cbsnews.com, coordinating multiplatform news coverage for CBS Miami and CBS Texas. He previously worked for outlets including Telemundo and The Miami Herald.
