2 students lost in Saugus High School shooting in Santa Clarita are mourned

Gracie Anne Muehlberger shined on the California Flyers, the Saugus High School cheer team.

Dominic Blackwell was in ROTC. He was known as a sweet kid with a big heart.

Muehlberger and Blackwell are being mourned by family, friends, teachers and schoolmates. The teenagers were shot to death when a fellow student opened fire on them and three others at the school on Thursday morning.

At 15-years-old, Muehlberger was part of a tight-knit group of cheer team members and coaches who traveled around Southern California for competitions and practiced together several days a week.

“She was a really critical part of our gym,” said 17-year-old Chloe White, who coached Muehlberger on the California Flyers. “We miss her a lot.”

White, who attends Hart High School, said Muehlberger was a charismatic performer who had a talent for tumbling. Her role was as her team’s base. She was working on becoming even better, White said. “She had so much more left to learn.”

Muehlberger was working on her back handspring and walkover moves. She could take any criticisms of her form with a smile, and “not roll her eyes,” White said.

Blackwell, who was 14-years-old, was described by classmate Alessandra Herrera as a well-liked kid who had a knack for taking “negative” comments directed at him in stride.

“He would just brush it aside,” said Herrera, 15 who had an English class with him. “He would just use it to make himself a better person.”

On Friday, two other students were recovering at Providence Holy Cross Medical Center in Mission Hills, according to Boris Borazjani, a trauma surgeon there. One was expected to be discharged Friday and the other on Saturday, he said.

“They held their composure despite being shot, and being shot in the torso is a very big deal,” Borazjani said at a news conference.

One of the girls, a 15-year-old, was flown to the Mission Hills hospital. Doctors performed surgery on her to check her abdominal wound, and surgeons took out a bullet that entered below the belly button and lodged in her left hip.

Her bullet wound was initially “very concerning” because it was near major blood vessels, said Borazjani, who greeted the patient outside the helicopter on Thursday.

They were also worried about her abdomen cavity being pierced, resulting in an intestinal injury. But they were able to rule both concerns out, the surgeon said.

A 14-year-old girl, also being treated at Providence, was shot in the abdomen and shoulder but they were superficial injuries that didn’t require surgery, and she was expected to be discharged Friday.

“Once we were done, they were both sitting up, smiling and talking,” Borazjani said.

Both girls were in “great spirits,” and despite their injuries they were both “calm and collected,” the doctor told reporters. He said he was proud of them for their stoicism.

A third shooting victim, a 14-year-old boy, was treated and released on Thursday.

Gov. Gavin Newsom visited the injured students at Providence Holy Cross Medical Center on Thursday. Newsom called their spirits “amazing.”

“A remarkable experience, being with 14-, 15-year-old survivors, that are consoling you, not the other way around,” Newsom told Fox11. “They had this remarkable resilience, smiles on their face, one just coming out of surgery, the other one with two gunshot wounds and just remarkably blessed that they are alive, their families with them.”

Newsom called the spirit of the wounded students “amazing.”

On Friday, Muehlberger’s cheer team coaches and a classmate were among those who came to a memorial site at Central Park, where they strung up paper hearts, decorated in blue glitter and covered in notes.

The night before, dozens of Saugus High School students held a vigil in the Park and mourned the loss of their peers. The school’s colors of blue and white were displayed in candles and balloons.

The suspected shooter, 16-year-old Nathaniel Berhow, also pulled the gun on himself. He died Friday afternoon.

Any motive for the killings, authorities said, remains a mystery.

Today a lil guy with a big heart lost his life in the Saugus Shooting. He was always smiling making people laugh, always positive, he was the sweetest kid ever and such a good kid. We need more people like you long live dominic blackwell, love you#LLDB #santaclaritashooting pic.twitter.com/lAE7lfImJM

— anthony martinez (@martin3zanthony) November 15, 2019

A memorial has taken shape at Central Park after the #SaugusHighShooting in Santa Clarita, CA where two students were killed, several were injured and the shooter remains in critical condition after he opened fire with a .45 caliber handgun Thursday morning shortly after 7:30am. pic.twitter.com/0xihDBPyFy

— David Crane (@vidcrane) November 15, 2019