At least eight people were killed when a transit employee opened fire at a light rail yard in San Jose, California, on Wednesday morning, the county sheriff's office said.
Santa Clara County Sheriff's Deputy Russell Davis said at a news conference that the gunman, a Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) employee, killed himself.
The shooting took place just before 7 a.m. Pacific Time at a light rail yard run by the VTA near the city's main airport. A bomb squad was searching the yard after "at least one" explosive device was found, Davis said.
"A horrible tragedy has happened today and our thoughts and love go out to the VTA family," Glenn Hendricks, the chairman of the VTA board, said at the news conference.
He said the shooting took place in a part of the yard where workers do maintenance on vehicles, and was not in the yard's operations and control center.
San Jose, a city with about 1 million residents, lies at the heart of Silicon Valley, a global center of technological innovation and home of some of America's biggest tech companies.
"We are in a very dark moment," San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo said at the news conference. "We will do everything possible to ensure this never happens again in our city."
The Federal Bureau of Investigation said it had agents assisting at the crime scene.
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