New York Giants play-by-play announcer and ‘some players’ escape Mall of America shooting

Giants radio play-by-play announcer Bob Papa and “some players” escaped a Mall of America shooting in Minneapolis on Friday night on the eve of the Giants’ game against the Minnesota Vikings.

The Giants were staying at a hotel adjacent to the mall. Pat Hanlon, the team’s executive vice president of communications, said he believes some players were in the mall at the time of the shooting.

“Everyone is back in the hotel and accounted for now,” Hanlon said Friday night.

Papa, 58, was born in Dumont and has been the Giants’ radio broadcaster since 1995, handling pre-game and postgame shows, too. He has called victories in Super Bowl XLII and Super Bowl XLVI, and a loss to the Baltimore Ravens in Super Bowl XXXV.

The shooting sent frightened customers at the nation’s largest shopping center racing into a lockdown just before the holiday weekend, mall officials and police in suburban Minneapolis said.

MORE: A video, possibly with the sound of shots fired, can be viewed here. WARNING: Profane language.

The Bloomington Police Department responded to the shooting shortly before 8 p.m., the mall said in a statement. The lockdown lasted for about an hour before the mall tweeted that shoppers were being sent outside. Emergency vehicles had converged in the snowy parking lot and police could be seen putting up yellow crime scene tape near the Nordstrom store.

Police did not immediately provide details on whether anyone was injured or arrested. A press briefing was scheduled for 10:30 p.m.

Videos posted on social media show shoppers hiding in stores, and an announcement in the mall warned people to seek shelter. Some videos show shoppers running for cover after a loud bang is heard.

The reported shooting comes as shopping centers and malls across the U.S. see an influx of customers just days before Christmas.

Jenny Hefty of Sioux Falls, South Dakota, and her 16-year-old daughter had just gotten off the escalator up to the mall’s second floor, in front of the Nordstrom store, when people started running toward them and screaming. Her daughter thought she heard gunshots, although Hefty did not.

“At first we thought they were just messing around,” she told The Associated Press on Friday night. “It was like ‘why are all these kids running by us?’”

Retailers began shutting their doors and her husband told them to run as armed guards rushed toward Nordstrom, where Hefty had been trying perfume about 20 minutes earlier.

The trio raced to their hotel in the mall complex and frantically tried to reach the couple’s 18-year-old daughter, 21-year-old son and their friends on their cellphones. They had been shut inside stores or whisked into safer spots as the mall locked down.

The family, which often travels the four hours to the mall, was in town for the Vikings game against the Giants on Saturday.

“Of course, we wanted to come early and do some Christmas shopping,” Hefty said.

The AP contributed to this report.

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