HESSTON, KAN (TIP): As many as seven people were killed and up to 30 others injured in a series of shootings Thursday, February 25, in Hesston, Kan., officials said.

Harvey County Sheriff T. Walton told KAKE-TV “anywhere from four to seven” people were killed, including a gunman, and between 20 to 30 people were shot.

Walton said in an earlier press conference there were “four to five” different crime scenes in the area including the Excel Industries plant in Hesston where dispatchers earlier said they were responding to a shooting.

He reported two other shootings nearby and one shooting in the plant parking lot before the shooting inside the Excel building.

The suspect was an Excel employee, Walton said.

“This is just a horrible incident,” he said. “There’s going to be a lot of sad people before this is all over.”

He said he couldn’t give an exact number of people killed and injured.

He added that the FBI and the Kansas Bureau of Investigation had been called in to assist.

Staff at Via Christi St. Francis Hospital in Wichita told KAKE-TV the facility has received six patients from Hesston.

Hesston is a community of about 3,700 residents about 35 miles north of Wichita.

The shooting comes less than a week after authorities say a man opened fire at several locations in Kalamazoo, Michigan, leaving six people dead and two severely wounded.