Deandrea Hamilton | Editor
PROVIDENCIALES, TCI — It took just 24 seconds to unleash the deadliest mass shooting in Turks and Caicos Islands history.
Security footage shows a white compact car pull into the parking lot of the Island Hookah & Cigar Lounge at 2:55:30 a.m. on Sunday, July 27. Within seconds, flashes of gunfire erupted at the entrance. By 2:55:54, the vehicle was gone—leaving behind death, devastation, and disbelief.
Inside the club, cellphone footage captured what no one should have had to see. A man sat slumped over the bar, hookah still beside him, propped on a stool—lifeless. Just feet away, two men lay face-down in their own blood. Their shoes had come off in the panic. Were they trying to run? It looked that way. Not far from them, a young woman, also on the ground, motionless. One shoe on. One off. A pool of blood beneath her.
The white-tiled floor offered no mercy and no secrets. Flashing club lights danced across chaos: broken chairs, scattered glasses, fleeing bodies, stunned silence.
Outside: No Safer
The parking lot wasn’t spared. There, the club’s security officer lay bleeding, sprawled on the ground near the metal detector that had clearly offered no match to the storm of bullets. A young woman—clad only in a bright orange bikini—frantically tried to help him. She became a nurse by necessity, desperately applying pressure to his wounds with whatever she could find, panicked and overwhelmed.
One victim groaned. Others did not move. Some patrons abandoned their cars, opting to run barefoot rather than risk being caught in the gunfire. It was chaos, fear, and heartbreak in real time.
Investigation Underway
As of now, four people are dead, ten injured, and two suspects are in police custody. The Royal Turks and Caicos Islands Police Force has not yet released the names of those arrested or the suspected number of gunmen involved, but CCTV and witness statements are being used to reconstruct the timeline and identify additional perpetrators.
Commissioner Fitz Bailey has vowed that this “deeply disturbing” attack will not go unanswered. More arrests are expected.
What’s clear is that this massacre was calculated, fast, and callous. It brought war-like carnage to an island known for serenity—and it did so in under half a minute.
