Pekka-Eric Auvinen poses with a pistol before embarking on a rampage that resulted in nine deaths, including his own

As he posed online with his murder weapon, the killer struck an eerie echo of Cho Seung Hui, who made recordings of himself that he posted to the NBC American television network before killing 32 students at Virginia Tech university, in Blacksburg, last April.

As Finnish police surrounded the school buildings in the town of Tuusula yesterday, students leapt to safety from windows and the killer turned the gun on himself. He was taken to hospital with critical head wounds where he died last night.

The 89 videos in Auvinen’s YouTube account will provide an insight into his state of mind amid fears that his murderous nihilism was nurtured by material he found on the internet. “He was moving systematically through the school hallways, knocking on the doors and shooting through the doors,” said Kim Kiuru, who was teaching a class when the shooting began.

“It felt unreal. A pupil I have taught myself was running towards me, screaming, a pistol in his hand.”

Among questions that the police will face is whether the YouTube video, which appeared in the hours before the attack, could have served as a warning that would have saved lives.

Set to a pounding heavy metal song called Stray Bullet, recorded by KMFDM, the clip showed a still photo of a low building that appeared to be Jokela High School. The song has macabre connections — its lyrics were posted on a website maintained by Eric Harris, one of the gunmen in the 1999 Columbine High School massacre.

The YouTube video continued with images of a young man practising with a firearm in forests similar to those that surround the 5,300-strong community of Tuusula, 30 miles north of the capital Helsinki. The screen then coloured red and the gunman was shown pointing his weapon at the camera, recalling the images recorded by Cho before the Virginia Tech killings.

The first shots rang out at Jokela High at around midday. Mr Kiuru said that the headmistress made an appeal over the public address system for all students to stay in their classrooms.

He said: “I stayed in the corridor to listen to more instructions, having locked my classroom door. After that I saw the gunman running with what appeared to be a small-calibre handgun in his hand through the doors toward me, after which I escaped to the corridor downstairs and ran in the opposite direction.”

Mr Kiuru said that he saw a woman’s body as he fled the building. “Then my pupils shouted at me out of the windows to ask what they should do and I told them to jump out of the windows . . . and all my pupils were saved.”

Miro Lukinmaa, a student, said: “Suddenly people began running and shots were heard and began raining down. I saw injured people lying in the corridor. We started to run and followed [the crowd] in panic. Everyone was trying to squeeze through a narrow door.”

Auvinen’s former girlfriend insisted that he was not crazy. “I have received many e-mails and phone calls claiming it is my fault and that I am a murderer because I rejected him,” said the 20-year old woman, who recently broke up with Auvinen.

Tuomas Hulkkonen, a student at the school, said that he knew the gunman well and that he had been acting strangely recently. “He withdrew into his shell,” he said. “I had noticed a change in him just recently, and I thought that perhaps he was a bit depressed, or something, but I couldn’t imagine that in reality he would do anything like this.” the investigation, said: “When police arrived there was complete chaos, pupils were jumping out of the building through the windows.”

Police did not confirm the name of the gunman, but said that he did not have a criminal record and acquired a licence for the gun on October 19.

Under the YouTube user-name of Sturmgeist89 — named after a Norwegian band — Auvinen posted a long manifesto, announcing: “I am prepared to fight and die for my cause.You might ask yourselves, why did I do this and what do I want. Well, most of you are too arrogant and closed-minded to understand.”

Campus shootings

32 Massacred at Virginia Tech, US, in April 2007 by Cho Seung Hui

18 Shot dead by expelled pupil in school in Erfurt, Germany, in 2002

12 Killed by two gunmen in 1999 at Columbine High School, Colorado

-jot from timesonline.com

Source: Times database