Carney set to attend vigil in Tumbler Ridge as questions linger about mass shooting

TUMBLER RIDGE – Prime Minister Mark Carney is set to visit the northern town of Tumbler Ridge, B.C., where residents continue to mourn and have questions about the mass shooting Tuesday that took the lives of nine people, including the shooter.

Carney is set to be joined by all federal party leaders, Gov. Gen. Mary Simon and B.C. Premier David Eby at a vigil Friday evening in the town of about 2,400.

RCMP have released the names and photos of the eight children and adults shot to death at a local home and at Tumbler Ridge Secondary School.

They say 18-year-old Jesse Van Rootselaar first killed her mother, 39-year-old Jennifer Jacobs, and 11-year-old stepbrother, Emmett Jacobs, at the family’s home. She then headed to the high school with two guns.

Five students were killed — Kylie Smith, Zoey Benoit, Ticaria Lampert and Abel Mwansa Jr., all 12, and Ezekiel Schofield, 13. Shannda Aviugana-Durand, 39, an education assistant at the school, was also killed.

Mounties say Van Rootselaar shot herself at the school and officers moved in.

In a Facebook post, Charlotte Overvold called Aviugana-Durand a best friend and hero.

Sarah Lampert says Ticaria was “the glue” for her large family.

“My daughter was a gift from the very start of her journey, an actual rose grown from the ashes,” she told reporters Thursday. “We now have to figure out how to live life without her.

“Simple things like going and getting in the van and turning around and not having a full head count is going to be hard.”

In the days since the shooting, Tumbler Ridge — and Canada — has seen support from leaders around the world, as far away as war-torn Ukraine and Australia.

In the town, memories of the tragedy seem to blend into everyday life.

Passersby to a makeshift memorial, adorned with candles and bouquets of flower, have placed items including teddy bears, a pack of gum and a Connor McDavid hockey card. On Friday, one person there recited a Bible verse.

Police officers walking down streets handed out stickers to kids with their parents.

Mounties have said they don’t know what motivated the Van Rootselaar. Police recovered a long gun and a handgun from the school.

RCMP said officers had been previously called to the family home for mental health concerns and guns were seized but later returned. It’s not known if any of those weapons were used in the shooting. 

Online platform Roblox said in a statement it had removed a game created by Van Rootselaar, which digital news company 404 Media said allowed players to massacre people in a shopping mall.

Jacobs’s Facebook page says she hailed from Newfoundland, and court documents say  she was estranged from Van Rootselaar’s father.

In 2015, Jacobs applied to move her children to her home province. A judge, citing multiple moves between Newfoundland, Alberta and B.C., denied the request, saying the children had led an “almost nomadic life.”

Justin Van Rootselaar, the shooter’s father, told media in a statement he was also estranged from his child and that she never used his surname.

“While that distance is the reality of our relationship, it does not lessen the heartbreak I feel for the pain that has been caused to innocent people and to the town we call home,” he said. 

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 13, 2026.