A witness to the Fort Lauderdale airport shooting says his laptop stopped a bullet from hitting him during the chaos of Friday’s attack.
Steve Frappier had just arrived in the airport and was in baggage claim, when a man opened his luggage, pulled out a 9 mm semiautomatic weapon and fired indiscriminately, killing five people and wounding another eight.
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FBI agents named Esteban Santiago, 26, of New Jersey, as the gunman. Charges against him are expected to be released on Saturday.
Frappier, 37, described Santiago as calm and collected.
“He never said anything the entire time,” Frappier told the Miami Herald.
Frappier said he crouched on the ground when he heard someone in the crowd calling out about a gun.
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“I was turned in such a way where that at one point when the shooter shot toward my direction … there was a bullet that ricocheted.”
He told the Herald he felt a muffled impact, but thought a piece of luggage fell on him.
It wasn’t until after Santiago surrendered that Frappier realized how close a call it was for him.
He opened his backpack and saw the damage the bullet had done.
“Later when I gave my backpack over to the FBI for investigation they found the bullet in the pocket of my backpack,” he told AC360.
“If I didn’t have that backpack on, the bullet would have shot me between the shoulders,” Frappier told the Herlad. “It still doesn’t feel real.”