Stephen Paddock, the man responsible for the shooting in Las Vegas in which 58 people were killed, fired incendiary bullets at a gas tank with the aim of causing an explosion, CNN said on Monday, citing two sources familiar with the investigation.
Last week it was learned that Paddock, who committed suicide after the Oct. 1 massacre, had fired from his Mandalay Bay hotel room to a gas tank at McCarran Airport in Las Vegas, but today CNN added that he did so with incendiary projectiles to cause an explosion.
According to the latest information, the investigators found incendiary bullets inside Paddock’s room and also near that fuel tank at the airport.
Prior to these revelations, airport officials last week clarified that jet fuel is specially designed to withstand a brief fire exposure, such as a standard rifle bullet, without catching or exploding.
Paddock, a 64-year-old retiree, is the sole suspect in the attack, and authorities have recovered 47 firearms that were owned by him, including 23 at the Mandalay Bay Hotel from which he shot the attendants of a country music festival.
It has also been confirmed that Paddock had about 22 kilograms of explosives and about 1,600 bullets in his car.
Authorities are continuing their investigation to determine the motive behind the killings, the deadliest in the country in recent decades.
