‘Blood was everywhere’: Orlando shooting survivors recall scenes of terror

Patience Carter said she laid on the ground of the women’s bathroom inside the Orlando nightclub “for hours and hours” hoping police would come.

Carter, 20,  described a horrific scene inside the Pulse nightclub as gunman Omar Mateen killed 49 people and wounded dozens more.

“People are getting hit by bullets, blood was everywhere and there was a moment when he stopped shooting in the bathroom,” Carter said, describing how Mateen stopped to fix his jammed rifle. She said the gunman told police over the phone that he pledged his allegiance to the Islamic State.

“The motive was very clear to us who were laying in our own blood and other people’s blood,” she said. “He wasn’t going to stop killing people until he was killed, until he felt like his message got out there.”

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "The motive was very clear to us who were laying in our own blood and other people's blood," she said. "He wasn't going to stop killing people until he was killed, until he felt like his message got out there."

The gunman was born in New York and his parents were born in Afghanistan.

WATCH: Orlando shooting survivor Patience Carter speaks with media

2:04 Orlando shooting survivor describes being held hostage by gunman: Part 3

• Orlando shooting survivor describes being held hostage by gunman: Part 3
• Orlando shooting survivor describes being held hostage by gunman: Part 2
• Orlando shooting survivor describes being held hostage by gunman: Part 1
• ‘The guilt of feeling lucky to be alive is heavy’: Orlando shooting victim reads emotional poem

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Patience was one of two survivors who spoke to a room packed with reporters and doctors at Orlando Regional Medical Center (ORMC). The hospital was one of three that took in dozens of victims suffering from gunshot wounds following the deadly rampage. ORMC chief trauma surgeon Dr. Michael Cheatham said 27 of the 44 patients who were taken to emergency rooms are still hospitalized.

Appearing on a hospital bed, Angel Santiago described a desperate attempt to escape from the shooter inside the nightclub’s bathroom.

“We heard the first round of shots go off, so immediately my friend and I fell to the ground to take cover,” Santiago told reporters. “My friend and I ran to the bathroom in the rear.

“The bathroom on the left had a large handicap stall that we knew about so we hid in there.”

WATCH: Orlando shooting survivor hid in washroom in attempt to escape gunman’s bullets

2:53 Orlando shooting survivor hid in washroom in attempt to escape gunman’s bullets

Santiago said he hid under a sink along with 15 to 20 other people already hiding in the handicap stall.

As the shooting inside the nightclub continued, Santiago said he could hear it closing in.

“I remember thinking ‘when is it going to stop?,’” he said. “I just kept hearing gunfire over, and over, and over again. It just kept getting louder, closer. And I could actually start to smell gun powder.”

“That’s when the bullets started going through the stall wall towards us … I was hit in my foot, my left foot, my right knee. I thought I was shot a third time but it ended up being a graze.”

READ MORE: Obama slams Donald Trump’s ‘shameful’ anti-Muslim rhetoric

Santiago said his friend was also shot along with “other fatalities that were evident almost immediately.”

Before Carter shared her story she read a poem she had written about her experience.

“The guilt of feeling grateful to be alive is heavy,” she said, holding back tears.

“Wanting to smile about surviving but not sure if the people around you are ready, as the world mourns the victims killed and viciously slain.”

WATCH: Orlando nightclub survivor describes attacker shooting him

4:11 ‘I’m next, I’m dead’: Orlando nightclub survivor describes attacker shooting him

Earlier Tuesday, the attending trauma surgeon on call that night, Dr. Chadwick Smith, described how he had to call for reinforcements.

“I said, ‘please come, please come. We need your help,'” Smith said. “This is not a drill. This is not a joke,” he told them. “‘I need you as fast as I can.’ Every answer I got was, ‘I’ll be right there.'”

Angel Colon, 26, was shot three times in his leg, and his bones shattered as he was trampled in the crowd. He described the gunman shot the injured, apparently “making sure they’re dead.”

“All I could do was just lay down there while everyone was just running on top of me,” he said. “And all I could hear was the shotgun one after another, and people screaming, people yelling for help.”

WATCH: ‘The shots just continued to go on’: Orlando shooting survivor emotionally describes scene inside nightclub

4:24 ‘The shots just continued to go on’: Orlando shooting survivor emotionally describes scene

“I look over and he shoots the girl next to me. And I’m just there lying down. I’m thinking, ‘I’m next, I’m dead.'”

Colon said the gunman shot “towards my head,” but “by the glory of God,” he got hit in the hand instead, and a second shot struck his hip.

“I was just prepared to just stay there, lying down, so he won’t know that I’m alive.”

WATCH: Survivors of the massacre at Orlando’s Pulse nightclub are speaking out. While there is tremendous relief to be alive, some are dealing with overwhelming guilt that they lived and 49 others died. Aarti Pole reports. 

3:09 Orlando shooting survivors recount horrific night of massacre

*With files from the Associated Press