www.roanoke.com

3:25 p.m.

In his presentation to the panel this afternoon, Col. Steve Flaherty, superintendent of the Virginia State Police, also gave details about Cho's actions before the shootings:
 
6:45 a.m.: Cho is spotted by a student waiting outside West Ambler Johnston entrance.
7:17 a.m.: Cho's access card is swiped at Harper Hall, his residence hall.
7:25 a.m.: Based on computer records, Cho accesses his student e-mail account.
8:10 to 8:20 a.m.: Based on a witness statement, Cho is spotted near the Duck Pond.
9:15 to 9:30 a.m.: Eyewitness accounts place Cho inside Norris Hall.

2:46 p.m.

Seung-Hui Cho had fired less than half of his ammunition when he took his own life inside Norris Hall on the morning of April 16.
 
Col. Steve Flaherty, superintendent of the Virginia State Police, said that, in addition to 174 fired rounds of ammunition found inside of Norris Hall from the shootings of morning of April 16, 203 live rounds were recovered. Cho also was armed with two knives and a claw hammer, Flaherty said.

2:30 p.m.

Virginia Tech President Charles Steger explained why the university decided to keep the media out of Norris Hall and West Ambler Johnston dormitory during the panel's tour of the buildings this morning.
 
Steger said the university's top priority is the welfare of the families of the victims.
 
"We have devoted our energies over the past month primarily to helping those families who lost their sons and daughters, mothers and fathers, husbands and wives, as well as the victims who survived," he said. "Let me note here that out of respect for these families, the university has denied requests by the media and others to enter Norris Hall. We made an exception to enable the panel to tour the building this morning because of the relevance to your work."
 
Steger said access to the buildings would eventually be granted to the public. Tech spokesman Larry Hincker said he prefers that happen sooner rather than later, but the university wanted family members who desire to see the scene to see it on their own before media coverage of the buildings is circulated.
 
"We have to be sensitive to the extraordinary emotional trauma," Hincker said. "There are searing memories of this event."

2:11 p.m.

Virginia Tech officials shed some light on the university's decision-making process on April 16 in testimony in front of the panel this morning and indicated that an incident last August involving a gunman near campus impacted those decisions.
 
David Ford, vice provost of academic affairs at Tech, took the committee through that morning step by step. He explained that the university's emergency policy group met at 8:30 a.m. in a Burruss Hall conference room to discuss the shootings that had occurred earlier that morning in West Ambler Johnston Hall. They made the decision to send out a message notifying the university community about the shootings.
 
That notice, sent at 9:26 a.m., said only that a shooting incident had occurred at West Ambler Johnston and that police were on the scene investigating. It urged caution and gave a number for people to call to report any suspicious activity.
 
Committee Chairman Col. Gerald Massengill pressed Ford on the university's initial reaction.
 
"Knowing what we know now ... shouldn't we have told the students, the people at Virginia Tech ... we've had a shooting and a shooter has not been apprehended?" he said.
 
Ford said the panic caused by erroneous reports about escaped convict William Morva being on campus last August made university officials wary of causing a panic. They only had limited information at the time, he added.
 
President Charles Steger also referenced the Morva incident several times today and replied to the committee after Massengill's question. Steger described the situation last August where people were running out of Squires Student Center because of erroneous reports that a dangerous gunman was inside the building, just as SWAT team members were running into the building to follow up on reports. While no one was hurt, the results could have been tragic, Steger said.
 
"That's the sort of thing we wanted to avoid," he said.

11:25 a.m.

The gubernatorial panel reviewing the Virginia Tech shootings spent about 20 minutes this morning walking through the second floor of Norris Hall, where 30 people and gunman Seung-Hui Cho died in the April 16 rampage.

Virginia Tech Police Chief Wendell Flinchum and Virginia State Police Superintendent Steve Flaherty accompanied panel members and staff through the building, which has remained closed to the public since the shootings. The panel's chairman, Gerald Massengill, said the tour provided little new information about the shootings. But seeing the building and hearing the accounts of law enforcement officers had an impact, he said.

"I'm not sure there are words to describe what we've seen this morning," said Massengill, a retired state police superintendent. "I've seen and heard a lot in my career, but this is almost undescribable."

The Norris Hall tour followed a closed-door briefing in Torgersen Hall, where the panel discussed the police investigation of the shootings and Cho's academic and mental health records. After leaving Norris Hall, the panel headed to West Ambler Johnston Hall, the dormitory building where two students were shot to death.

The panel was scheduled to begin its public meeting at 10:30 a.m., but the start was delayed until 11:15 a.m.
 

8:30 a.m.

A gubernatorial panel examining the Virginia Tech shootings began a day-long meeting on the Blacksburg campus this morning by voting to close part of its session to the media and public.

Despite objections from several media organizations, the Virginia Tech Incident Review Panel voted to close a session in which they were scheduled to discuss the academic and mental health records of the gunman involved in the April 16 shootings that left 32 students and faculty dead.

The eight-member panel also planned to tour the two buildings where the killings occurred -- West Ambler Johnston Hall and Norris Hall. University officials decided the bar the press and public from those buildings, said Gerald Massengill, the chairman of the panel.

"We're touring the facility to get a feel for the environment, to get a proximity of the buildings," Massengill said. "There will be no questioning of anyone, just a tour. Whether the media is allowed to accompany us or go into those buildings is not the decision of this panel."

Tech spokesman Larry Hincker declined to comment on the university's decision to deny public access to the buildings, saying President Charles Steger would explain the decision during the panel's public meeting later this morning.

Gov. Tim Kaine appointed the panel last month and said he wanted it to operate in a public and transparent fashion. Massengill said the panel remains committed to heeding the governor's charge, but would go into closed session to discuss information protected under the Virginia Freedom of Information Act.

"We want this process to be as public as we can make it," Massengill said. "But I think, or I hope, that you understand that there are certain sensitive materials that are allowed for within Virginia law that we must allow for."