On Dec. 13, a gunman opened fire on Brown University, killing two and wounding nine. One graduate student, 25‑year‑old Eva Erickson, escaped the blast by chance.
She left her graduate office around 4 p.m., minutes before the shooting began in the building. At that moment she was already out and had taken shelter in the school’s indoor track and basketball area.
The 25‑year‑old recalled, “I was leaving the building within five minutes of the shooter coming in.”
In a follow‑up video, Erickson—who is currently a PhD candidate in engineering and fluid and thermal science at the Ivy League university—shared that she was only allowed to return to her off‑campus residence at around 1:30 a.m.
“On campus today has just been so eerie,” she added. “Everybody is leaving. Everyone is trying to get the hell away from Brown to get home to their families where they can feel safe.”
And it was especially emotional for her as she drove past Barus & Holley, the building where the shooting took place. “The door that I had exited mere minutes before the shooter would have entered was covered up. Boarded off, crime scene tape all around the building. Still a lot of police presence,” Erickson said.
Erickson—who is also captain of the school’s club hockey team—added that she’d heard from all of her friends and lab mates during the initial lockdown and they were “all good.” But following the shooting, the reality star felt all the “what ifs” coming into her mind.
“All I can think is that it could have been one of my friends,” she continued, “that could have been one of my teammates.”
“You think that this is never going to happen to you,” Erickson shared. “It’s never going to happen on your campus. It was never going to happen on Brown, right? But it did and it could have happened to anyone. And that’s what’s so scary.”
Police presence remained heavy in the aftermath, with crime scene tape covering the perimeter and officers stationed around the campus. The scene was still being secured as students and faculty recounted the events.
Erickson ended her video by saying she was hoping for a change, adding, “This can’t keep happening at schools across America.” “I don’t know if I don’t have the tools,” she said, “but somebody does, and somebody can make a change here.”
Key Takeaways
- Eva Erickson, a 25‑year‑old PhD candidate, narrowly avoided the Dec. 13 campus shooting.
- She left the building at 4 p.m. and was only allowed back at 1:30 a.m.
- The incident sparked her call for nationwide school safety reforms.
Her testimony underscores the fragility of campus safety and the urgent need for proactive measures to protect students, faculty, and staff from such tragedies.
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