Prime Minister Carney to attend vigil in Tumbler Ridge Friday with other leaders

By Canadian Press on February 12, 2026.

OTTAWA — Prime Minister Mark Carney’s office has confirmed he will visit Tumbler Ridge, B.C., to attend a vigil on Friday, three days after nine people died in a mass shooting there.

Carney, who invited other federal party leaders to join him at the vigil, was to have been in Germany for the Munich Security Conference this week but cancelled that trip after the tragedy in the northeastern B.C. town on Tuesday. He is attending the vigil at the invitation of the town’s mayor.

The offices of Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre, Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet, NDP interim leader Don Davies and Green Party Leader Elizabeth May have all told The Canadian Press they will attend the vigil.

Police said 18-year-old Jesse Van Rootselaar shot her mother and 11-year-old stepbrother at their home in Tumbler Ridge on Tuesday before going to a school where she shot five students, all 12 or 13 years old, and a teacher.

B.C. Premier David Eby and federal Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree are currently in the small northern B.C. town of about 2,700 people.

More than two dozen people were injured in the shooting and Eby said one of them, a 12-year-old girl named Maya Gebala, is “clinging to life in hospital.”

Party leaders pushed politics aside on Wednesday and unanimously agreed to suspend normal House of Commons procedures for the day. MPs instead gathered briefly for a moment of silence and leaders delivered emotional statements calling for kindness and unity in honour of the victims.

Carney said the attack left Canada “in shock and all of us in mourning.” He said the federal government is providing whatever support it can to the community.

Flags on federal buildings are being flown at half-mast for a week.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 12, 2026.

— With files from Brenna Owen in Tumbler Ridge

Canadian Press staff, The Canadian Press