>> building a better bay area, moving forward, finding solutions this is abc7 news. >> answers here on abc 7. every day, we talk with experts about the issues important to the bay area and get answers in real time. today we will talk to the vice president of animal care conservation and research for the oakland zoo. they are mourning the loss of one of their beloved african elephants. with another power for storm -- powerful storm on the way, they residents are experiencing storm fatigue we will hear from a psychology professor about the phenomenon. the top story, authorities in nashville, tennessee investigating the latest mass shooting at school. three children and three staff members were killed.

the shooter was killed by authorities inside the private school. we will be speaking with the executive director and cofounder of givers about the mass shootings. let's get a check with weather anchor spencer christian. here we go again. another big storm on the horizon. spencer: we are suffering from storm fatigue even those of us who forecast the weather. current conditions, calm. we mainly sunny skies and the wind is calm with wind speeds at the surface under 15 miles per hour in most locations. that column will not lost very long -- last three long under blue skies right now. temperatures around a 60 to 60 five degrees. palo alto, santa farah, pool 52. we are looking northward. the storm will develop north and move southward. we see blue skies looking that direction. 63 in novato. low 60's in napa.

live view from m -- emeryville. you can see no hit of a storm -- hint of a storm but it is closing around us. a level two storm will develop overnight and. through the day tomorrow we expect heavy rains and strong wind gusts. it will be a challenging morning commute. scattered showers on wednesday. a sunny and dry pattern later in the week. the approaching storm on the exclusive abc 7 storm is a level two but it will have moments of intensity with rain heavy a times. it will occur between 9:00 a.m. and 1:00 tomorrow. it will be windy and gusty. likelihood of downed trees and power outages. low storm levels at the beginning. thunders possible as well. i'll show you the forecast animation at 10:00. light rain will be developing in the north bay between 10:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m.. we will see the storm expand and, intensify sweeping southward and eastward.

during the morning commute, we will get the most intense elements of the storm with heavy downpours, as the storm continues to expand in the afternoon across the entire region. it will wind down with the most intense features of the store moving out of the bay area by 6:00 tomorrow. there will be lots of showers and periods -- areas of light rain, following the main body of the storm into wednesday. by wednesday night at 11:00, rainfall totals just under an inch in the south bay many locations near the bay see totals near 1.5 inches. in the north bay, over two inches in santa rosa. a wind advisory will be in effect tomorrow for the entire bay area with wind gusts ranging from 45 to 55 miles per hour. overnight low temperatures will be in the mid 40's. it will not be cold tonight, but it will be wet and windy and uncomfortable. highs on the cool side in the low to mid 50's. as we look ahead at the

accuweather 7-day forecast, after tomorrow's level two storms we will have showers on wednesday. we finally get the dry, mostly sunny break all of us are looking forward to thursday and friday. or unsettled weather coming our way over the weekend. -- more unsettling weather coming our way over the weekend. be prepared for another impactful storm tomorrow. dion: good advice. the storm system is not over. now, to the story that has been gripping our nation. police say the latest school shooter is a 28-year-old nashville woman who was shot and killed in nashville, tennessee. the shooting was targeted and planned. the shooter had documents related to the incident. within the past hour, please confirm the shooter's self identified as transgender but did not provide details. president biden spoke about the tragedy. >> it is heartbreaking. the families worst nightmares. the shooter in the situation reportedly had two assault weapons and a pistol.

i call on congress again to pass my assault weapons man. dion: joining us live is peter, the executive director and cofounder of a nonprofit that fights to end gun violence. thank you for being here. it seems, in recent years and our own reporting, that the suspect involved are generally men. i remember a suspected female shooter was involved in the youtube campus shooting in 2018 in the bay area. how common is the shooter to be female? >> we don't know a lot right now about the shooter, about their motivations, about what transpired. we know that there are six victims, six fatalities, three little children, ages eight and nine, three adults in their 60's. we also know that the industry

over the past several years has spent a lot of time and money trying to market to others, young people, women, i don't think we can be surprised that the makeup of shooters like this starts to shift over time, as the industry attempts to put more guns in the hands of more potential shooters. dion: there are many other motivating factors behind that. we hear time and time again from lawmakers, from politicians and every day, various groups that incidents like this, that gun control is the answer to stopping these mass shootings. is that the solution? >> absolutely. gun safety laws have been demonstrated in states across the country, including in california, to be effective at keeping kids in communities safe. gun violence is the number one cause of death in this country, for children, it is wrong. put it is also solvable -- but

it is also solvable. the gun safety issue has become divisive in washington that is not true across the country. we talked ordinary people. we don't know what happened in nashville, and what the fact pattern is. we do know looking at similar shootings and broader gun violence across the country, that policies like universal background checks, licensing, extreme risk red flag laws have, can and we hope will make this country safer in the future. it's incumbent on democrats and republicans to listen to the mass majority of americans. 90% of all americans, democrats, republicans, gun owners, non-gun owners support stronger gun laws like universal background checks. we need our elected officials to listen to their voters. dion: in your opinion, you gave that figure of 90%. overwhelmingly, it appears this

country knows there needs to be a solution, once -- want stricter laws in place. what is preventing this from coming into fruition? what are the hurtles you are seeing out there? >> money is a big problem. the firearms industry has wrapped itself into the extreme far right of the conservative movement. the senator from the state of tennessee, one of them, martha blackburn has taken 1.5 million dollars over the course of her career from the gun lobby. you see similar levels of support, officials at the state level, tennessee just recently, the governor signed into law, a carry bill that will make tennessee more dangerous. it's already the state in the country with the 10th highest rate of gun violence and with some of the worst loss. w rank theme as -- we rank them as having a failing grade.

there is so much they can do. here is what we know. research shows that in safety laws work. we know the public supports them by wide margins. we have shown, last year with the passage of the bipartisan, safer communities act that we can bring democrats and republicans together in support of safer gun laws. we need to do the -- this at an ongoing basis and we need to see courage from our politicians. dion: we continue to see that message after each of the shootings happened. i feel as though there is that fatigue, it's now or truly never. briefly, comparing to other countries in the world, where i visited, and you hear that this is not a problem elsewhere, can you give us a sense of what the u.s. deals with compared to the rest of the world? >> the united states has a rate of gun violence that is 25 times the rate of gun violence that

our peer nations across the world experience. that is because we are running a tragic, natural experiment in america, to see what happens when you combine widespread civilian firearms ownership with lax and nonexistent gun laws. the gun lobby likes to pointed everything besides gun access, they will say it's poverty, bad schools, bad parenting, video games, facebook. the excuses go on and on. the truth is, at the end of the day, if we want our country to be safer, if we want gun violence to low longer -- to no longer be the leading cause of death we have to step up our gun laws. we can have gun laws that responsible, firearms ownership while keeping guns out of the hands of people should not have them.

who are responsible for tragedies like these. i have confidence that based on the courage of survivors who have taken their stories of loss and translated those into action in washington, that we can get this done. it's going to take a lot of effort. by a lot of dion: dion: people eye-opening statistics. peter ambler from the giffords nonprofit. >> thanks for having me. dion: as we move on today, the oakland zoo is mourning the loss of a 46-year-old african elephant. we'll talk to these use vice president of animal care and research more to explain why that was. stay with us.

dion: the oakland zoo is mourning the loss of one of their beloved african elements. lisa, the 46-year-old was euthanized, due to the reversible health issues. joining us is colleen kinsley, the vice president of animal care, conservation and research for the oakland zoo. i'm so sorry to hear about her passing, she has been at the zoo since 1979. she was so loved by many. what legacy does she leave behind? >> oh. i mean, she has been an important animal to us. very beloved by our zoo and the community. she has been here for such a long time. she's an individual that helped us shape our program, both in terms of our conservation work and also in terms of our animal welfare work. we were the first zoo to use

protective contact, which is a way for caring for elephants that use only positive reinforcement. we were pioneers. she is very special. but she was also very special in important elephant both in the world of zoo elephants and elephant conservation. dion: her impact will live on. we saw video of hearst washing around in the water. from what we know. lisa had been dealing with progressive arthritis. can you tell us how you do --treat an animal so large with this condition? >> very complicated. you are seeing some pictures of her doing some exercises, getting her to lift her not all that different from what we do in caring for ourselves. hot water soaks. maintaining flexibility.

using some medication to with reducing inflammation. we also did some very innovative work and new work in animals. you are seeing her get her stem cell treatments. this is to help rebuild the cartilage in those areas that have been damaged. so, the incredible work of our hospital team and also our elephant/animal care team. we extended lisa's life. and gave her a good quality of life. she was able to maintain good mobility for much longer than she might have otherwise. but in the end, we felt that it really was that she was getting to the point where her body was tired and not helping her. the best thing was to let her go. dion: she has lived a good quality of life. going back to the stem cells video we showed, it is fascinating. you saw these the giant syringe is being implemented -- syringes

being implemented. talk about the efficacy of the treatments. did they work and how much of bennett -- how much of a benefit was it for her? >> it's one of those early stages with wild animals. lisa was only one of the very few elephants that had gotten this treatment. we do feel like it gave her some increased mobility. it did not have the overall effect we were hoping. we were hoping we might see a turnaround in some of her mobility issues. but, we think that it did help to some degree. it is very early in i wild animals. we are still learning a lot about how to administer the treatments and how effective they can be in individuals. there is variability with that. dion: you talked about how many

came to see lisa at the zoo. these elephants are very social animals with other elephants, i imagine. how are they dealing with her passing? i know there's a level of empathy that animals feel. >> for sure. lisa had very close relationships with her other female elephants. they have been together for 33 years. so, right now, our team is very focused the female elephant. female elephants are closely bonded. they spend almost all of their time in close proximity. they're able to communicate with each other. so, it's a big change. for donna. we are monitoring her closely. the elephant team is staying with her, 24 hours a day, to help her get through this change. so far, she's doing pretty well. the keeper came --

part of her family. males are much more flexible in their social behavior, but he is part of her family. dion: i can imagine. before we go, we have to ask you this, the oakland zoo has been through an awful lot in recent months. we reported on the closures you have had because of the weather. your close tomorrow. how is the zoo handling this? >> well, it has been a challenge. a challenge for everybody in the bay area with t-storms. we've been closed for 15 d because of the collapse of the road entrance and the severe storm damage. that has been quite a bit of income for us, $30,000 a day for us. that is our name operating budget for the zoo. it is a big hit. it causes a lot of stress and difficulty with our aviary collapse. we had six birds frightened out

of the aviary. we have been able to recover all but one of them. we are still looking for one of our birds. it's been a tough winter. dion: we wish you a the best of luck -- the best of luck going forward, hoping the storm systems will end soon. to you, colleen, thank you so much for being here. >> thank you, my pleasure. dion: with another powerful storm bearing down on the bay area, many people are experiencing something called storm fatigue. we t here to tell you about life insurance through the colonial penn program. if you're age 50 to 85, and looking to buy life insurance on a fixed budget, remember the three ps. the three what? the three ps? what are the three ps? the three ps of life insurance on a fixed budget are price, price, and price. a price you can afford,

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psychology professor, dr. thomas. thanks for being here. >> thank you fora having me. dion: i thought this was a nickname, like myself who may be tired of all the rain. maybe we complain, but there is psychology about how it makes suspect. -- makes us act. >> on the one hand we are calling it storm fatigue. for a lot of people, it could be storm post-traumatic stress. as we know, so many people have had terrible flooding, property damage, some people have passed away by getting hit, by debris. so, this is an important phenomenon that we should all be mindful of. the thing we're worried of, learned helplessness, which is basically, people get used to the storms, they give up and don't do the various precautions that they need to do in order to keep themselves safe and healthy, as well as their loved

ones. it's a concern, for sure. in the bay area, we are not used to this. dion: now that you've talked about what this concept is, how do you get people to get past the fatigue, to start paying attention? we saw with covid that we had so much information pelted at us about it. eventually, we may have felt like we lost interest, maybe didn't want to feel so motivated about getting our boosters. what can people do to combat this fatigue? >> it is always a concern. we have the natural tendency to be in denial about things, that things will work out. most people think, well that happens to somebody else, somebody else will have trouble of flooding or trouble with trees falling down. so one thing we need to do is take a deep breath try to remind ourselves that we are all susceptible to a certain degree of denial and fatigue and say, ok what do we need to do to cope well with yet another storm?

we need practical coping, like who will help me if my power goes out. and we also need emotional coping so we can get connected to one another, take care of one another, and both emotionally cope and in a practical way, cope with the various ways that can happen. we need to do this together. dion: i am glad you mentioned that. as you were talking, we were showing video showing the devastating consequences of what we have seen. the consequences on human life in the bay area. five people killed by falling trees in one day. the windows falling out of buildings onto the street below. you touched upon ptsd. can you elaborate more on ptsd in this scenario? we often think of it associated with war or something traumatic, or something that is directly affected to us. but you can experience it, by just seeing it in your community. >> sure. you can have.

vicarious ptsd. . bu we have sot many people in our community who have been terribly impacted. all the terrible flooding and trees coming down, and loss of life. loos of property -- loss of property. a lot of people have had a great deal of stress and strain, through all of this. again, since we are not used to it, it is kind of new to us in the bay area. i have been living here. . for 35 years i have never seen anything like this. there can be a degree of ptsd among those who have been impacted. i would say that those who have been particularly impacted, they are vulnerable to ptsd. those, most of us, who are hassled by it, that is probably more of what we may say is storm fatigue, where you get tired of it all, and at some point you might just tune it out. that's dangerous, because we do need to be vigilant.

it's hard to keep our vigilance up, storm after storm after storm. dion: on a lighthearted note, are you ready for sunshine? >> oh yes. i am absolutely ready for sunshine i did not move to california for all this weather. i'm certainly looking forward to it. we have been hoping and praying for rain to get rid of this drought of ours. in some respects we got it in spades. while it's wonderful to get this rain for our drought, we want it in a way that doesn't hurt anybody. unfortunately, these storms have hurt a lot of people. dion: dr. thomas plante, many thanks to you. i had no idea how much i wamy case was worth. c call the barnes firm to find out what your case could be worth.

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dion: thanks so much for joining us for getting answers. we will be here every weekday at 3:00 answering que ♪ ♪ >> tonight, breaking news as we come on the air. a deadly shooting in nashville. three children and staff members killed. we are on the scene of the deadly tornado emergency here in mississippi. one tornado alone on the ground for 59 miles. first tonight, that deadly school shooting at a christian grade school in nashville. three children and three staff members killed. the alleged shooter believed to be a former student. police racing into the school, hearing gunshots on the second floor. the suspect shot and killed by police. frighten children boarding school buses, holding each other, hand-in-hand, on the way to being r