Brandon man injured in Las Vegas shooting

A Brandon man was one of more than 500 injured following a rapid-fire barrage on an outdoor concert festival on Sunday in Las Vegas. Fifty-nine people were reportedly killed.

Brian Wills, along with his wife, Cindy, and 10 friends from Brandon, were in the crowd of the Route 91 Harvest Festival, a three-day country music event, when Wills was struck by a bullet in his left leg. 

On Monday morning, Wills posted the following on his Facebook account: 

“Just wanted to let everyone know that Cindy and our friends are safe. I was shot in the left leg. Broken fibula. No major arterial damage. I look forward to seeing everyone when we are back home. I will pass along more information as we hear it. Great, Brave friends in our lives.”

Knowing others didn’t survive the mass attack, from his hospital bed at Sanford Health in Sioux Falls Tuesday morning, Wills said, “I feel very fortunate. I absolutely do. I believe that myself and the rest of the people in my group that we are fortunate. Everybody’s safe.”

The Brandon group arrived at the outdoor concert about 7 p.m., Wills said, and the main entertaine, Jason Aldean, had been on stage 15 to 20 minutes when the gunfire erupted. Wills said that it was utter chaos at that point.

“Everything that you see on television reflects what’s happening at that point,” he said. “It looks just as awful on TV as it does in person, only you feel a lot more confused as to what’s going on.”

Struck by a single bullet, Wills underwent surgery Tuesday morning to repair a hole the bullet punched in the fibula of his left leg. With no major damage to his arteries, Wills remains optimistic for his recovery.

Because Cindy and the other women were watching the concert 30 to 40 yards ahead of the men in their group, Wills said they became separated “when things got crazy.”

“We didn’t know (where each other was) right away,” he said. “It was tough communicating, phones were dying at the end of the night, running out of juice.” 

Wills said a couple of his travel companions helped him into a pickup and transported him to a Las Vegas hospital. He remembers lying on a hospital floor alongside “people around you bleeding,” he said. “It was a challenging time for hospital staff in Las Vegas.”

“It took some time for folks to be able to get back to our hotel and some helped other to find safety,” he added.

The Wills were transported back to Sioux Falls on Monday evening via a Sanford Health chartered plane.

“I’m not sure how that worked,” Wills said. “They contacted Cindy and Sanford sent one of their planes and picked us up. I’m very appreciative of that, as it would have been very challenging to be on a commercial flight.”

The Wills had a private reunion with their two sons at the Sioux Falls airport on Monday.

“As anyone reacts, you want to see your kids, see your spouse, that’s what we wanted to see first,” he said. 

The shooter, identified by law enforcement officials as Stephen Paddock, 64, of Mesquite, Nev., sparked the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history when he opened fire on a crowd of more than 22,0000 concertgoers across the street from a window on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Hotel and Casino. 

When authorities gained access to the suspect’s room, they found Paddock had turned the gun on himself.

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