At 12, Maya Gębala Tried to Lock a School Library Door. She Was Shot — and Lived.

On 10 February 2026, 12-year-old Maya Gębala was in the library at Tumbler Ridge Secondary School in northeastern British Columbia when an 18-year-old former student opened fire. Most of those killed at the school died in or near that room.

Classmates tried to secure the library. Relatives later said the lock would not hold. Maya stayed at the door for a few seconds, trying to lock it, then ran to hide. She was shot in the head and neck — later accounts said three wounds, including the cheek. Friends noticed a finger still moving and helped get her out. She was airlifted to BC Children’s Hospital in Vancouver.

Doctors operated more than once. For days her mother, Cia Edmonds, was told the brain injury might be unsurvivable; a fundraising page said the family had been warned she “can’t possibly make it.” Then came small signs — a response to stimulus, a hand movement. She left intensive care and entered a long rehabilitation. By spring, court filings described a child who was awake and recognised her mother’s face and voice, with catastrophic injuries and an uncertain future. By summer, Canadian papers were writing about her as a rare public thread of hope from a town that had lost eight people.

Police identified the attacker as Jesse Van Rootselaar, 18, who killed her mother, Jennifer Jacobs (also identified as Jennifer Strang), 39, and her 11-year-old half-brother, Emmett Jacobs, at home, then went to the school. Dead at the school were students Abel Mwansa, 12; Kylie Smith, 12; Zoey Benoit, 12; Ticaria Lampert, 12; Ezekiel Schofield, 13; and education assistant Shannda Aviugana-Durand, 39. Van Rootselaar died by suicide. Another student, Paige Hoekstra, was also seriously wounded.

Maya’s aunt, Krysta Hunt, told Global News that the girl tried to lock the door “to save the other kids.” Her parents have described an outdoor, athletic child — hockey, horses, climbing — who, in the worst minutes of her life, put the door before herself.

She was 12. The lock did not work. The attempt is what her family asked the public to remember.

Sources

• CBC News / Radio-Canada: identification of Maya Gebala; victim list; hospital updates
• Global News, “B.C. school shooting victim tried to lock library door to save her classmates”
• The Independent; The Globe and Mail; Associated Press; New York Times (Feb. 2026 shooting reports)