'Mommy, I’m alive': Parents recall daughter’s chilling call after Idaho In-N-Out massacre

TWIN FALLS, IDAHO: For several agonising minutes, West Covina residents Nikki and Michael Ahern feared the worst. 

A breaking news alert on Saturday, August 1 reported a mass shooting at an In-N-Out Burger in Twin Falls, Idaho, the very restaurant where their 24-year-old daughter had been working.

Then came silence. No text. No phone call. No way of knowing whether she had survived.

When the call finally came, it wasn't from her own phone, and the first words they heard were enough to bring both relief and heartbreak.

Survivor's parents recall terrifying silence

The Aherns said they first learned about the shooting through a notification on the Citizen app.

Their daughter had travelled to Idaho as part of an experienced In-N-Out training team helping prepare employees at the company's newly opened Twin Falls location.

As reports of an active shooter spread, the family desperately waited for her to contact them.

The call never came from her own phone because, while escaping the chaos, she had fled the restaurant without it.

Eventually, she borrowed a friend's phone. "Mommy, mommy, mommy... Mommy, I'm alive," Nikki Ahern recalled her daughter saying through tears.

Their daughter assured them officers were already on the scene, but then delivered another painful piece of news, one of her co-workers had been shot.

Even after learning their daughter had survived, the emotional shock lingered.

"It felt like being powerless," Nikki said. "It took a long time for clarification."

Although grateful their daughter escaped alive, the Aherns said they were disappointed by what they describe as a lack of communication during the emergency.

They said they never received any notification from In-N-Out informing them about the shooting or their daughter's status, despite emergency contact information being on file.

"There's got to be a protocol," Michael Ahern said. "You have an emergency contact list, right?"

The family said their daughter also lost access to her cellphone during the frantic escape and remained without it in the aftermath of the shooting.

The deadly Idaho shooting

The shooting unfolded on Saturday afternoon outside the newly opened In-N-Out Burger in Twin Falls, Idaho, where authorities say 24-year-old Chad Williams opened fire, sending customers and employees scrambling for safety.

Police later confirmed that three people were killed and seven others were injured during the attack.

Among those who lost their lives was a female In-N-Out employee, according to company president Lynsi Snyder.

The violence came to an end after Williams turned the gun on himself. He later died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, authorities said.

Investigators continue working to establish what motivated the attack.

The incident also drew national attention after armed bystander Jordan Salinas confronted the gunman during the shooting, an action many believe prevented even greater loss of life.