Cambridge shooting witnesses describe terror on Memorial Drive: "He's shooting all over the place"

The shooting on Memorial Drive in Cambridge, Massachusetts Monday left two men in critical condition Tuesday as police tried to piece together what happened.

Investigators said 46-year-old Tyler Brown of Boston walked down the street with a rifle and randomly shot 50-to-60 rounds at people and cars. He was later shot by a state trooper and a Marine veteran. Brown was still in the hospital Tuesday.

The shooting was terrifying for witnesses. When some drivers heard the first shots and realized what was happening, they got out of their cars and ran for their lives.

Here are some of the eyewitness accounts from what happened at 1:30 p.m. Monday on Memorial Drive.

"He's shooting all over the place"

"At first, we heard sounds, which no one could sort of make sense of it. Then the shots were so frequent and then such rapid succession. It was just like, 'This sounds like gunfire' and then he had a large rifle, an automatic weapon," said witness Todd Czubek.

"He was shooting randomly, up in the air, spraying the area," Czubek said. "He's shooting all over the place, goes into the road, all the cars are stopped both ways and he's just shooting. People started to get out of their vehicles and run, including me."

"You never think, anybody, that you'll be involved in it and then it happens. It's crazy," Czubek said.

"Blood everywhere"

Brandon Mansolf was driving and ended up caught in the crossfire.

"I saw a couple cars immediately swerve over to the other side of the road, cut across the grass," he told CBS News Boston. "Figured it was a pissed off driver. Kept hearing pops. Got out, walked up to the car in front of me, to my co-worker to see what was going on. Saw the dude in the street, lifted (the gun) up at me. I dipped back into my car and jumped down behind my dashboard. My buddy got out, he ran for it."

"Bullet hit my radiator, all of my coolant all over the road," Mansolf said. "State trooper pulled up directly on the side of me, got out, got behind his car, right in front of my driver's side mirror, got into the gunfight with him."

"I was ducked down behind my dashboard," Mansolf said. When he looked up, the gunman was on the ground. "Blood everywhere. Shell casings all in front of my car, his car." 

"Like a video game"

Witness Joseph Minino-Rodriguez heard the gunfire and called 911. He saw it unfold from outside his apartment window as the gunman approached a car.

"I thought this was like a video game," Minino-Rodriguez said. "He's hitting the window a couple of times. He's like mad. He's frustrated. I don't know what happened. I don't know what's going on with him. He's hitting the window. He's talking to the car inside. He didn't shoot it."

Witnesses said the gunman was screaming but they couldn't understand what he was saying. He was walking up and down the street re-racking the rifle and shooting at passing cars.

"He probably tried to stop traffic to a certain point, because it was a good amount, it was a good amount of people. He tried to stop the traffic at a certain amount. He thought it was a perfect time to just start letting it go," Minino-Rodriguez said.

"I was running for my life"

"It wasn't like a regular gunfire. It was like pow, pow, pow, pow, pow," a woman told CBS News Boston.

Another woman said she just ran down the street when she heard the shots.

"And then they took me in this building over here because I was all shook and everything. I was running for my life." 

At a news conference Monday night, Middlesex District Attorney Marian Ryan said troopers found some drivers hiding under their cars during the shooting. She said at least a dozen vehicles were hit. 

Memorial Drive was closed for about nine hours Monday. Police are looking for drivers who abandoned their cars during the shooting so they can get them back to their owners. 

Ryan said hundreds of witnesses will be interviewed. Anyone with video of the shooting is urged to reach out to Massachusetts State Police.