At least six people were killed in Saturday afternoon’s attack on the Main Square in Krakow, when a 25-year-old Polish man opened fire on the public. Two police officers were shot during the intervention, and one of them was “undoubtedly” saved by his surgeon colleague, Polish surgeon and professor Michal Pędziwiatr told the BBC.
We rushed to the scene of the shooting and began the rescue operation, as there were no ambulances available and we did not see any professionals, he said.
Blood loss from gunshot wounds can quickly become life-threatening. One of the surgeons used his hands to stop the bleeding from the most seriously injured police officer.
Treating the shooter
In addition to the police officers, the surgeons helped a third person. It soon emerged that this was the suspected shooter.
As a doctor, it does not matter to me whether someone is a victim or a suspect. It is not our job to decide what will happen to this man. For us, he was another seriously injured victim, Pędziwiatr told the BBC.
The perpetrator died of his injuries in hospital on Monday. The two police officers who were shot are still receiving treatment. Both are said to have woken up from comas, and their condition is assessed as stable. According to Polish media reports, police were on the scene three minutes after receiving the first alarm.
“They probably saved many lives, without thinking about the risk of losing their own,” Prime Minister Donald Tusk wrote about the police officers on X.
A Poland in shock
The mass shooting in Krakow has shaken the whole of Poland, and the shock is still being felt. Warsaw resident Magdalena Frączek was injured by shrapnel as she sought shelter:
I threw an elderly woman behind a flower pot. I protected her with my body. I saw him (the shooter) out of the corner of my eye - he was walking just a few meters behind me, she told the AP news agency.
Four women and two men were killed in the attack, and about 15 were injured. Three more victims - the perpetrator’s mother, father and sister - were found dead in their home in Ostrowiec Świętokrzyski, a town northeast of Krakow.
The suspect had a firearms licence and was armed with a semi-automatic AR-15 rifle. Several weapons and ammunition have been seized - they were found in the man’s vehicle in Kraków and in the apartment in his hometown, Polish news site [Onet] reported. There is no known motive for the shooting yet.
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