My name is Zach Johnston. I am a student at Columbine High school in Jefferson County Colorado. It is on this site that I will try to explain from my personal point of view what happened to my school on April 20, 1999. Sorry if the grammEr is below average, I really do not care. I spent about 5 minutes deciding what I would write here, then I just let it all out. I will express my views as well as feelings about this seemingly unavoidable tragedy. The things I say are what I think or believe what happened. Not actually what happened. I will only place bits and pieces of what I know on this site

I woke up at 6:10 a.m. on April 20, 1999. I had a fairly bad cold and a soar throat. I didn’t feel like going to school but since my friend was picking me up I didn’t want to make her drive for nothing. She arrived at my house and we proceeded to goto school at Columbine Senior High. Since April 20 is 4:20, it was a day that many students were supposed to love and enjoy for various reasons. Heh. Various people told me "Happy 4:20 Zach!" and "its 4:20 and I have an important date with you know who." The day seemed pretty normal. I think I faired well on my math test and we watched Cyrano De Bergerac in World Studies. After math I rushed to my locker to meet a friend so we could go out for lunch. The time was precisely 11:00 and we headed to my house because I didn’t feel so well and wanted to take some Tylenol. At about 11:30 we headed back for school. We were headed north on Pierce when suddenly we saw a police cruiser in the middle of the road beside a cargo van and a little Mazda. I figured "oh well another accident that could have been prevented and everyone is over reacting." I had no idea how wrong I was. I told the person driving to head in the Woodmar neighborhood so we could get to school using my "stealth" route. We were then passed by a bunch of kids in a White Cherokee who were honking and waving their arms at us. I thought to myself "Crap they wanna beat me up and we cant get away because her car is too slow" Then they honked at everyone else so I felt a lot better. I then told her to try a different way to school. We headed north on Wadsworth then turned and went on Bowles where we eventually got to piece the street my school is one. This is where I knew something was very wrong.

Piece was blocked off from this side of school as well. As we waited in a crowded intersection as cops desperately tried to guide traffic, I saw a horde of my fellow students running towards us. I yelled at a Girl I knew and asked her what happened. She said "Some guys in black charged into school and just shot everyone!!!" I saw hundreds of parents who somehow found out about all this. They were running every which way trying to find their sons and daughters. It was a terribly disturbing sight. I remember specifically one little girl from my choir class crying about how she saw her friend get shot. My first thought was to get home as quickly as possible to call my Mom since I knew she would find out about all this before I would, so I did just that. We did a U turn and headed back to my house. I live about 1 mile from the school and counted 35 police cars passing us as we drove. Ambulances and police cars barging over medians motorcycle cops weaving through opposite traffic almost killing themselves. Its actually quite amazing that police units can do such wide fishtails and keep control. By the time I got home and called my mom to tell her I was okay, the thought of what was happening hadn’t quite sinked in yet.

My friend called her mom and aunt and stuff. When she got off the phone, she told me her brother and cousin were still in the school somewhere. Her brother later called and said he got out but her cousin was still inside.

I ran into the family room and turned on the TV. Every station was covering the situation at my school. Several stations had Ariel shots that amazed me. Of course the media blurted out a bunch of crap about the situation that they knew nothing of, and basically made stuff up as they went along. I never knew how much the media is full of crap about things until they talk about stuff I know about personally.

I live on top of a huge hill overlooking the entire Denver Metro Area and could see the school in the distance. I counted 5 helicopters and 2 planes circling the premises. I could also see Clement park where tons of parents desperately searched to find their children. The southwest side is the part of the school I could view. The Library and Cafeteria are both on this side. Apparently this is where all the action was taking place. The entire southwest side of the school is a huge glass window. Several windows were shattered. This is basically all I could see from here.

The TV said that there were still 900 some odd students left in the school with the gunmen. This is about half the population of the student body. While I watched and wondered for myself what was happening, I knew in my heart who was responsible for this massacre. About a month ago my friends …

and I went out to lunch. After lunch we had the same World History class so we would talk together. We would often pass these 2 kids who wore trench coats. Everyone referred to them as the "Trench Coat Mafia". My friend Cale referred to them as the "RammStein Boyz". Whatever you wanted to call them, you could tell they were different. Well, one day, Clae snarled a remark about Rammstein under his breath as we passed these 2 guys. The short one who was named Eric Harris confronted my friend about it. He said "Everyday you pass me and make fun of me saying Rammstien sucks. Why do you do this crap asshole? What did I do to you?" My friend replied "Oh man your so cool, you’re my idol!" Then Eric’s friend Dylan approached us seeming to back up his friend. I really didn’t want to get involved in a fight even though I knew these guys wouldn’t stand a chance. I was afraid of things they might do afterwards. Eric was a short clean cut looking kid and Dylan was a very tall skinny guy with messed up hair. He always wore the trench coat, a hat and dark sunglasses. The bell rang and they left and we went into class. That was the end of the confrontation.

When I got my facts straight and figured out that 2 gunmen entered the school and killed several people I knew, I figured the Trench Coat Mafia was responsible. Many helpless crying people said they recognized them as this group. I was shocked to understand that my hunch was correct. They showed the pictures of Eric Harris and Dylan on TV. Once I saw their pictures, I knew they had no demands or intent to leave Columbine High school alive.

This is the way I think it happened. I have heard several stories from the media, friends, and others, but put this one together myself…

Eric