Joseph Meyn speaks with CNN on Saturday, July 13.

CNN

One attendee at the Trump rally described the shooting on Saturday night as “complete pandemonium,” with some in the crowd unsure of what was happening at first.

“It seemed initially like firecrackers went off,” Joseph Meyn told CNN from Butler, Pennsylvania, where the shooting happened.

He described seeing a man in the bleachers near him hit in the head by gunfire, and another woman nearby being hit in the arm. He said it was hard to figure out which direction the gunfire was coming from, and he added that police moved quickly to clear the bleachers.

“It’s something you don’t expect … it’s very shocking,” Meyn added. “We shouldn’t be at a level of public political discourse in this country where this is going on, it feels like it’s 1960.”

Meyn, a surgeon from Grove City, Pennsylvania, said he looked back in the direction the gunshots had come from. “I saw a man in the bleachers was hit directly in the head, and died instantly. There was a woman who was hit in the hand and forearm, a noncritical wound,” he said.

He said he went to see whether he could render aid, but another doctor was already helping the woman who’d been shot. 

CNN reached Meyn as he was waiting to give a witness statement to the FBI. “They want the data off my phone,” he said. “This is the first Trump rally I’ve been to. You don’t really expect an assassination attempt.”

This post has been updated with additional information.

Correction: This post has been updated with the correct name of the attendee.