Summary Information

In 2018, a total of 340 shooting incidents occurred across the country. During these tragic events, 373 people were killed and 1347 people were injured. The city that was impacted the most by shooting, in terms of number of deaths and injured, was Chicago, and the state that was most impacted was California.

Summary of Shooting Incidence Across the States in 2018

Although there were states like Utah, Massachusetts and Connecticut where there were luckily zero deaths from shooting, majority of the states had certain numbers of death as well as injuries caused by shooting. The table also shows some surprisingly tragic numbers of deaths and injuries in states like Florida and California, where there were average monthly death rate of more than 4 people.

State Average monthly death rate Total Death Total Injured
California 4.1666667 50 136
Florida 4.0000000 48 132
Pennsylvania 2.9166667 35 63
Texas 2.4166667 29 62
Illinois 1.7500000 21 150
Tennessee 1.5833333 19 68
Louisiana 1.2500000 15 50
North Carolina 1.1666667 14 37
Maryland 1.0833333 13 31
Ohio 1.0833333 13 46
Alabama 1.0000000 12 55
Missouri 1.0000000 12 52
Indiana 0.8333333 10 27
Michigan 0.8333333 10 28
Colorado 0.7500000 9 27
Arkansas 0.5833333 7 17
Kentucky 0.5833333 7 25
Delaware 0.4166667 5 0
New Mexico 0.4166667 5 4
New York 0.4166667 5 53
South Carolina 0.4166667 5 19
Arizona 0.3333333 4 5
New Jersey 0.3333333 4 54
Washington 0.3333333 4 9
Georgia 0.2500000 3 33
Nevada 0.2500000 3 15
District of Columbia 0.1666667 2 23
Oklahoma 0.1666667 2 19
Virginia 0.1666667 2 17
Kansas 0.0833333 1 11
Minnesota 0.0833333 1 14
Mississippi 0.0833333 1 17
Nebraska 0.0833333 1 16
Wisconsin 0.0833333 1 16
Connecticut 0.0000000 0 8
Massachusetts 0.0000000 0 4
Utah 0.0000000 0 4

Mass Shooting Incident at Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida

On February 14, 2018, Nikolas Cruz, a 19 year old former student from Stoneman Douglas High School, located in 5901 Pine Island Rd, open fired a semi-automatic rifle in and out of the school. There was a total of 34 victims from this massacre, of which 17 people were killed and 17 were injured. According to the federal and local authorities, there was no indication that the gunman had an accomplice or accomplices. An article from CNN reported that some of the victims included students, teachers, and a football coach at the school. The day after the incident, former President Donald Trump tweeted that there were “many signs the Florida shooter was mentally disturbed”.

A Victim from the mass shooting Additional Information on the Florida Mass Shooting can be found in the articles below:

-NBC News Report on the Incident

-CNN News Report on the Victims of the Incident

Geographical View on the Shooting Incidents

The circle markers on the map each represent a shooting incident that occurred in 2018 at that location. The colors of the circles range from light yellow to red, light yellow representing a relatively lower number of deaths and injured and red representing a relatively higher number from the shooting incident. The size of the circles is also proportionate to the the severity of the incident. The main purpose of this visual representation is to enhance the audience’s perception on which area of the country the shooting incidents occurred and help compare the severity of the incidents across different states and cities in the United States.

Two interesting observations from the map

-There were more shooting incidents in the eastern region than the western region of the country.

-The mass shooting incident in Florida recorded the highest number of victims from shooting in year 2018.

Shooting Incidents Over Time in 2018

The chart below shows how the number of shooting incidents changed over the months in year 2018 in the United States. Each plot connected to a line clearly shows which months the shooting incident increased or decreased, as well as in which time of the year the number of incidents was at its maximum or at its minimum. I chose to visualize the data in the form of plots(position) and connect lines (slope + angle), which are two of the most effective methods for visualizing quantitative data.

Two interesting observations from the chart

  • Month of June had the highest number of shooting incidents in year 2018.

  • The overall trend of shooting incidents in year 2018: increase in the number of incidents towards the summer season, reaching its highest in June, then decrease in the number towards the winter season.