By Idrees Ali and Phil Stewart
(Reuters) -Three of the five U.S. soldiers wounded in a military base shooting in Georgia on Wednesday have been released from a hospital and all are expected to make a full recovery, the U.S. Army said on Thursday, praising the fast actions by fellow soldiers to subdue the shooter and treat the injured, saving lives.
A U.S. Army sergeant is suspected of having shot and wounded five soldiers with a personal handgun on Wednesday at Fort Stewart-Hunter Army Airfield near Savannah.
The suspect, who was taken into custody, has been identified as Quornelius Radford, 28, an active-duty sergeant specializing in automated logistics.
Brigadier General John Lubas, who commands Fort Stewart, said one of the injured soldiers had a “little bit longer road to recovery,” but doctors expected her to fully recover.
Lubas, along with Army Secretary Daniel Driscoll, recounted how one soldier tackled the suspect and wrestled his gun away when the shooting started.
A second soldier jumped on the suspect and restrained him until police arrived. Others attended to the wounded soldiers.
“We talked to doctors, and one of the things that I can say unequivocally is that the fast action of these soldiers, under stress and under trauma and under fire, absolutely saved lives from being lost,” Driscoll told reporters.
The Army said it was too early to speculate on the motive for the shooting.
Mass shootings are relatively common in the United States, where guns are widely available, and military bases, which are among the highest-security places in the country, have not been spared.
The deadliest was at the Fort Hood Army base in 2009, when a major fatally shot unarmed soldiers in a medical building with a laser-sighted handgun, killing 13 people and injuring more than 30. Less than five years later, a soldier at the same Texas base fatally shot three service members and injured 16 others before killing himself.
Fort Stewart is located in Hinesville, about 225 miles (362 km) southeast of Atlanta and 40 miles (64 km) southwest of Savannah. Nearly 9,000 people live at the base, according to the 2020 Census.
The base supports approximately 15,000 active-duty Army military personnel, as well as thousands of military retirees, family members and others, according to its website.
(Reporting by Idrees Ali and Phil Stewart; Editing by Franklin Paul and Mark Porter)
