Queen Elizabeth II paid tribute to the victims, and the Prince of Wales later visited Whitehaven in the wake of the tragedy.

Bird prevented Commons from driving away by firing twice with a double-barrelled shotgun – which he had earlier sawn off (the barrel and a saw being later found at his home)[2][3] – hitting him once in the shoulder.

When Rewcastle approached Bird's taxi, he was shot twice at point-blank range with the rifle, hitting him in the lower face, chest, and abdomen.

As a result of the shootings, unarmed officers at the local police station were informed and began following Bird's taxi as it drove onto Coach Road.

There, Bird fired his shotgun at a passing taxi, injuring the male driver, Terry Kennedy, and the female passenger, Emma Percival.

[16] Bird proceeded to drive through several local towns, firing apparently at random, and calling a majority of the victims over to his taxi before shooting them.

Upon arriving in Egremont, he stopped alongside Susan Hughes as she walked home from shopping, and shot her in the chest and abdomen with the shotgun.

[1][9][10] This was followed by the shooting of Leslie Hunter, who was called over to Bird's taxi before being shot in the face at close range with the shotgun, then a second time in the back after he turned away to protect himself.

Bird then went south towards Thornhill, where he fired his shotgun at Ashley Glaister, a teenage girl; however, he missed her and she ran off back towards her sister's home.

[17] He then drove back to Carleton and killed Isaac Dixon, a mole-catcher, who was fatally shot twice at close range as he was talking to a farmer in a field.

[1][9][10] A former semi-professional rugby player, Garry Purdham, was soon shot and killed while working in a field outside the Red Admiral Hotel at Boonwood, near Gosforth.

He shot a motorist named James "Jamie" Clark, who suffered a fatal wound to the head, although it was not clear at first whether he died from the gunshot or the subsequent car crash.

Seconds later, while on the same street, Bird fatally shot Jane Robinson in the neck and head at point-blank range after apparently calling her over.

Arriving in Boot, Bird briefly stopped at a business premises called Sim's Travel and fired his rifle at nearby people, but missed.

This was shortly followed by a couple who had stopped their car to take a photo; Samantha Chrystie suffered severe wounds to the face from a rifle bullet.

[11] At around 12:36, armed police officers and dog handlers arrived at the scene of Bird's abandoned taxi and began a search in and around the wooded area.

[22][23] During the manhunt, the gates of the nearby Sellafield nuclear reprocessing plant were closed as a precaution, and the afternoon shift was told not to come to work.

They also confirmed that two weapons (a sawn-off double-barrelled shotgun and a .22-calibre rifle with a scope and silencer) had been used by the suspect in the attacks, and that 30 crime scenes were being investigated.

The speculation was heightened when it was revealed that he had targeted and killed both his twin, David, and the family's solicitor, Kevin Commons, in his attacks.

[45] According to Mark Cooper, a fellow taxi driver who had known him for fifteen years, Bird had accumulated £60,000 in a secret bank account and was worried he would be sent to prison for hiding the cash from the government.

[50] On the evening of 2 June, Queen Elizabeth II said she was "deeply shocked" by the shootings and shared the nation's "grief and horror".

Transmissions of ITV soap Coronation Street were cancelled on 2, 3, and 4 June as the scheduled broadcast was a week-long special involving a violent storyline featuring a gun siege in a factory.

[55] American pop singer Lady Gaga came under criticism after performing a murder scene at her concert in Manchester, as part of her Monster Ball Tour, just hours after the shooting spree.

[56] On 9 June 2010, a week after the incident, memorial services were held in the West Cumbria towns affected by the shootings followed by a minute's silence at midday.

The minute's silence for the Cumbria victims was also marked prior to David Cameron's second Prime Minister's Questions in Parliament.