Cumbria Shootings: Police And Locals Use Twitter To Publish Warnings

The shootings in Cumbria carried out by taxi driver Derek Bird, which have claimed the lives of at 12 people, is the latest news story to unfold in real-time, with police and local residents posting minute-by-minute updates on Twitter.



Local residents and police began regularly updating their Twitter feeds throughout the day, when the gunman began his shooting spree at around 10.30am, before killing himself.
As the story gathered pace, people in the area began to warn others to stay indoors to hide from Bird, tweeting using two hashtags: #whitehaven and #cumbria. Twitter members use hashtags to help them narrow their searches to find out what matters are being discussed by other Twitter users.

At approximately 1pm Cumbria Police tweeted the following: “Urgent public message - Shots fired in Whitehaven” and then posed a link to a longer update officers had written about the topic. This was the strategy the policemen continue to use throughout the day.
One hour later the officers used Twitter to post a photo of Bird and warned any walkers or tourists in the Cumbria area to be “vigilant, take extra care and head indoors if at all possible”, when they learned that Bird had abandoned his car and was on foot.

Local residents and journalists in the area continued to use the microblogging service throughout the day to let other people know about the shootings and give a real-time update as to their safety and surroundings.
One Twitter user tweeted: “Tourists oblivious to the news went to help Derrick Bird when he crashed his car - lucky to be alive.”
While another, @moushu, kept people updated with the latest rescue efforts: “Rescue helicopter at Boot waiting for the ambulances to ferry casualties”. However, according to those in the area tweeting via their phones, mobile signal was heavily intermittent, leaving many unable to call each other. Twitter, for many, became the only way to communicate and check if family members were safe.

People around the world could only read with horror as the shooting spree unfolded and was captured in real-time on the microblogging site.
Last year Twitter signed a deal with Google which allowed the most popular search engine to index tweets, making it easier for more people to find out the latest information about an event in real-time.