The woman who survived the horrific on-air shooting of two journalists dove desperately after the gunman missed twice — but was hit in the back and managed to walk to an ambulance, her husband told ABC News.
“He shot three times at my wife — she was trying to dodge everything. He missed twice and then she dove to the ground and curled up in a ball and he shot her in the back,” Tim Gardner told the network.
Vicki Gardner didn’t see raged-filled Vester Lee Flanagan II approach — with a pistol in one hand and a camera in the other — because of lights from the camera as she was being interviewed, her husband told the network.
Gardner, the head of the local chamber of commerce, told her husband about the terrifying ordeal when she awoke from a medically induced coma after her second surgery.
“I don’t think she ever felt like she was in danger after she got up and walked to the ambulance after being shot, but she didn’t know the extent of her injuries at that point, but the surgeon told me that a couple of centimeters and she wouldn’t be walking and a couple of centimeters more and she wouldn’t be alive,” her hubby said.
She had a kidney and part of her colon removed, ABC News reported.
“She’s slowly becoming aware of how much attention it’s getting. She’s just … well, she’s just a little torn up about things at the moment,” he said.
Meanwhile, authorities said WDBJ reporter Alison Parker, 24, and cameraman Adam Ward, 27, both suffered gunshot wounds to the head.
The medical examiner’s office in Roanoke said Friday that Parker’s official cause of death was gunshot wounds to the head and chest. Ward’s cause of death was gunshot wounds to the head and torso.
Homicide is listed as the manner of death for both victims.
The medical examiner’s office did not specify how many times they were shot during Wednesday’s rampage at the hands of the unhinged Flanagan — who accused Parker and others of being racists, among a litany of other grievances.
Flanagan sent a text message to a pal indicating he had “done something stupid,” according to a search warrant.
He was found with a self-inflicted gunshot wound in a rental car hours after the shooting. In the car, cops found a briefcase with a wig, shawl and three license plates.
Also found in the vehicle were a 9mm Glock handgun and six ammunition magazines.
On Friday morning, the Bridgewater Plaza in Moneta, Virginia, where the shooting took place, was reopened.
Lesley Kocsis, manager of Gifts Ahoy, and another employee unloaded handbags and put merchandise on shelves.
“It’s very bittersweet, but we are glad to be back,” said Kocsis, who saw the shooting on live TV Wednesday, about an hour before she normally comes in to work.
“It’s cliche, but things like that don’t happen here,” she said.
With Post Wires