A 24-year-old West Covina woman who survived the Twin Falls In-N-Out shooting had been part of an “all-star team” sent to train employees at the newly opened location.
A West Covina family says their 24-year-old daughter is traumatized after she ran for her life when a gunman opened fire at an In-N-Out restaurant in Twin Falls, Idaho, and the woman, who had been sent to Idaho to help train employees at the newly opened restaurant, survived the shooting, but her family says she has barely been able to speak since.
Michael and Nikki Ahearn said their daughter was only in Idaho for a work trip and was training employees at the Twin Falls In-N-Out, which had been open for just over a week.
On August 1, a mass shooting occurred at and near an In-N-Out Burger restaurant in Twin Falls, Idaho, with three people killed and seven others injured.
The Aherns were alerted to the shooting through the Citizen App, and knowing their daughter was there, they awaited a phone call from their daughter.
It never came from her phone, they said, as while the shooting was active, their daughter fled the scene without her cell phone, delaying her ability to contact family to let them know she was OK, though she was later able to reach her parents from a friend’s phone.
“All she could get out [on the initial phone call] was ‘mommy, mommy, mommy,’ crying, ‘mommy, I’m alive'” Nikki said, describing the moment her daughter reached her after the gunfire.
Michael said he asked his daughter if police officers had arrived yet and if she was safe, which she said yes to, but added that a co-worker had been shot.
Nikki said the experience felt like “[It felt like] being powerless.”
“It took a long time for clarification,” she added.
The Aherns turned their attention to In-N-Out, saying that the company failed to alert them to the active situation and didn’t provide crucial information.
“There’s got to be a protocol,” Michael Ahern argued.
The family said company policy requires employees to put away their phones while working.
More than 24 hours after the shooting, they said their daughter’s phone remained part of the crime scene, leaving them with no direct way to contact her.
“When I hear that I can’t be there to give her a hug, when I can’t just call her, when I can’t just reach out whenever I feel like, like there’s nothing that we can do at all,” Michael said.
“She’s like, ‘I’m just sorry. I had to run. I had to get out. Everybody was getting out, and I would just push the button, and I had to crawl out. I’m hiding. I’m hiding next door,'” Michael said, recounting his daughter’s words after the evacuation.
Nikki said she never expected her daughter would be caught in an active shooter situation while at work, saying, “A flood of emotion and thoughts are running through my head, but I never thought, you know, my daughter was in a place where there was an active shooter.”
“The greatest fear that a parent can have is that their child passes before them,” Nikki said.
The suspected shooter, identified as 24-year-old Chad Williams, died from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound after being confronted by an armed off-duty Idaho state trooper and a private citizen.
In the viral moment that emerged from the incident, the parents’ harrowing account of their daughter’s first terrified call went public as they criticized In-N-Out’s communication failures.
A West Covina family learned about Saturday’s deadly mass shooting at an In-N-Out in Idaho the same as many did — a news alert on their phone, and for the ensuing moments, time felt like an excruciating, panic-inducing eternity.
Their Southern California-based 24-year-old daughter was part of an “all-star team” assembled to travel to Twin Falls, Idaho, to help train new associates as they open the new location.
Around 2:30 p.m. local time, shots rang out as a gunman entered the store.
Lynsi Snyder, the president of In-N-Out Burger, said a worker was among those killed, saying “She was taking care of our most important asset — our customers, and her life was taken by a disgusting human who doesn’t value the lives of others or his own.”
Snyder wrote in a statement, “My heart is broken, my chest is heavy, my eyes burn from the tears I’ve shed. We lost one of our beautiful Associates tonight. She was taking care of our most important asset – our Customers, and her life was taken by a disgusting human who doesn’t value the lives of others or his own. He shot both on our property and off, and ended his life shortly after he took the precious lives of our Associate and Customers, innocent people who never saw it coming.”
Snyder said her heart “goes out” to those affected by the shooting, including witnesses to the “traumatic event,” adding, “We will stand together, and we will do everything we can to learn from this situation.”
Jordan Salinas, a 35-year-old healthcare worker, identified himself as one of the two people who fired toward the gunman, telling the Idaho Statesman that it was an “automatic” response, and Salinas said he was with his girlfriend stopping for lunch when the shooting erupted, prompting him to reach for his semi-automatic pistol.
The Ahearn family’s experience has ignited questions about corporate emergency response protocols when mass violence strikes.
The In-N-Out location, the fourth in Idaho, opened July 24, according to a news release from the California-based chain.