Spanish survivor of Florida school shooting heads gun control campaign

Alfonso Calderón, 16 (pictured), originally from Alcobendas a few kilometres to the east of Madrid, is heading up the movement Never Again, which is calling for the Whitehouse to clamp down on weapons possession.

He is spearheading the pressure group along with classmates David Hogg and Emma González from the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida – a massive student movement that has gone viral around the globe calling for strict gun control in the USA.

The immense power of the USA's National Rifle Association (NRA) and national president Donald Trump's unwillingness to ban firearms possession means the students have a huge battle on their hands – as yet, Trump's response has been, instead of restricting gun sales, to consider arming school teachers.

“We want to start a dialogue, speak to our senators and with people from other political parties,” Calderón explains.

“Things in this country are changing slowly, and that's what's important.”

The Valentine's Day school killer, Nikolas Cruz, 19, is an ex-pupil of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas who was expelled, and whose social media posts have caused great concern – especially where he claimed he wanted to become a 'professional school shooter'.

“If someone had sat down with him for five minutes, they would have realised he was not someone who should have been carrying an AR-15 military rifle,” Calderón argues.

“It is not used for hunting and is not for self-protection; it's made and designed to kill people.”

Alfonso Calderón said he knew Nikolas Cruz, but not very well – they were not friends or even acquaintances, and the killer's reputation at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas was 'very bad'.

“He didn't have many friends; he was very anti-social,” Alfonso explains.

“[Cruz] seemed a very sinister person, almost evil,” Alfonso reflects.

Students at the Parkland high school are 'not ready' to return to class or resume their studies yet so soon after 'the greatest tragedy of their lives', says the Spaniard, who has lived in Florida with his parents since he was six years old.

“It's going to be difficult to go to school and see guards and police around the building where the massacre happened,” he admits.

Alfonso says the shoot-out happened very quickly – firstly, he heard the fire alarm go off, then heard the sound of shots ringing out, and his female teacher ordered all the pupils in her class to get into a cupboard – around 50 of them were crammed into a space of 'three or four square metres' for four hours, where 'the heat was hell'.

Spaniard Patricia Rivas, 40, from Calahorra, La Rioja reportedly sheltered her pupils for four hours in a cupboard, meaning she and the teens in her class survived unscathed, according to her mother Violeta Puerta at home in northern Spain, but it has not been confirmed whether Alfonso Calderón was one of those students.

Alfonso, visibly shaken, said he sent a text message to his parents to tell them what was happening and adding that he 'loved them very much' and that they were 'the best parents in the world', and asking them to 'forgive him' for 'any time he may have disappointed them', since, at that moment, he was convinced he was going to die.

This conviction was heightened when he saw a man with a rifle pass by the window; however, “thank God, it was a police officer. They broke the glass, opened the door and pointed their guns at us,” Alfonso recalls.

“They asked if any of us was injured and whether any of us was armed and, when we said no to both questions, they evacuated us.

“It was at that moment, running out of the building with my friends, that I was able to grab my mobile and ring my parents – it was probably the best phone call I've ever made in my life.”

Calderón hoped to major in law at university, but he is now considering reading political sciences instead, since he 'is a very good public speaker'.

Along with hundreds of his fellow pupils, Calderón has organised a series of protest marches for the Never Again movement which will take place on March 24 in a number of towns and cities across the USA, calling for tighter controls on gun sales.