Police are frantically looking for a shooter after a mass shooting on Thursday morning that was connected to a property dispute resulted in the deaths of three persons.
Acting Superintendent Tom Armitt told reporters, “We are aggressively combing the area and starting our investigations into what the circumstances were and how these folks had been shot.”
“At this point, this probe is at its very early phases. We are unsure about the culprit.
A 30-year-old male who survived the shooting left the area.
Following the incident at Bogie, a small town in north Queensland’s Whitsundays around 40 kilometers west of Bowen, he was taken to the hospital in serious condition with a gunshot wound to the stomach.
Members of the same family comprise the four victims.
Bogie is a mining community with a little more than 200 residents.
The wounded man was able to go to another house, “many, many kilometers away,” from the secluded acreage where the shooting had occurred, and there he called the police.
He had emergency surgery after being transported to Mackay Base Hospital in a severe condition.
According to Inspector Armitt, “He was able to inform investigators that he had been shot and that three other people had also been shot.”
“We think the man was able to get away from there.” He was scurrying away from the area.
‘Originally, when the male person spoke to us, he was obviously in a very distressed state and there was some confusion about where the shooting had occurred.
Based on the limited information that was given, we were able to perform our own searches, and we had to alter the location of the occurrence based on the crime scene that we discovered.
A further exclusion zone was formed at a residence along Shannonvale Road where the shooting is thought to have taken place after police searched the area where the injured man was discovered.
Although it took the police many hours to examine and clear the area, Inspector Armitt said, “we have designated a crime scene in the distant rural spot where we believe we have identified three deceased victims.”
Around 11.30 am, the region was declared to be under an emergency.
‘Investigations remain ongoing into the circumstances leading up to the shooting,’ the police said.
‘Police are currently conducting emergency operations in the area and requesting members of the public and aircraft to not attend the declared location.’
Acting Superintendent Armitt stated that police are cleaning the “large” property and would remain there “as long as we need to perform our job.”
The police have advised everyone to stay away from the exclusion zone even though nobody else resides there.
Working on the road that connects Bogie and Bowen, Peter Delamothe Road, a lady previously informed Daily Mail Australia that she observed many police cars heading toward the gunshot scene.
‘I saw at least three police cars while I was outside and heard a few more sirens after that,’ she said.
‘It’s not usually what you see. I thought straight away that something bad had happened.’
According to reports, Bowen Hospital rushed medical personnel to Collinsville Hospital, the location of the incident, with blood supplies and other supplies.
Three people have been confirmed deceased following a shooting at a rural property in Bogie near Collinsville this morning. https://t.co/6iYwYfktIc pic.twitter.com/smwHlVn7y5
— Queensland Police (@QldPolice) August 4, 2022
There were apparently up to eight ambulances sent from Townsville, Mackay, and Rockhampton.
When someone called to inform them that there had been “a gunshot at the Bogie,” Opal Ridge Motel employee Elly Colls told the Guardian that she first learnt of the event at around 11 a.m.
Better secure the home, she said. Because I don’t believe they located him.
The incident was related to a property dispute between the owners of two nearby houses, according to a second resident who spoke to the Courier Mail.
According to him, the conflict between the parties involved was not new.
Others in the community called the gunshot “odd” and “weird” for the often-peaceful neighborhood.
At the scene of a mass shooting in rural Queensland, where three people were murdered, a helicopter is visible.