German school shooting: Watch video of gunman Tim Kretschmer's final moments

He uttered only five chilling words as he murdered his innocent victims in cold blood yesterday.

As the last signs of life ebbed away from the bullet-ridden teenagers, deranged gunman Tim Kretschmer barked at them: “Are you all dead yet?”

The 17-year-old killed 15 people in a massacre that has shocked Europe and left classrooms running with blood.

Nine students – eight of them girls – aged 14 to 16 were cut down by the former pupil described as someone who “hated the world”. Most were shot in the head.

Dressed in black police combat gear and wearing a gas mask, Kretschmer also slaughtered three teachers during his three-hour killing spree.

One was murdered as she bravely tried to end to his bloodbath by confronting him and trying to stare him down.

Police said: “He gunned her down with ice-cold efficiency.”

The maniac shot dead three members of the public while on the rampage in Winnenden, near Stuttgart, Germany, before turning the gun on himself. As he fired at the terrified youngsters from his a Berretta automatic pistol, emergency operators could hear gunshots and the noise of panic on the phones of those that called for help.

Children and teachers leapt from classroom windows to escape the carnage.

Police warned the death toll could rise as doctors battled to save the wounded. The number of injured were not known.

One girl pupil who escaped the hail of bullets said of the gunman: “He hated the world. He was always a weirdo, obsessed with death metal music and guns.

“He was an angry guy, a loner. No one was sorry to see the back of him when he left. He never had a girlfriend and there was some trouble at the school one time over his bullying.” Police Chief Erwin Hetger said of the bloodbath. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Stunned local politician Heribert Rech said the children killed “still had their pens in their hands when he started firing”.

Kretschmer’s victims at the 1,000-pupil Albertville Secondary School were mostly in Classroom 10D – the same place where he studied for and failed his exams.

Believed to have been a playground bully, he left the school two years ago.

Authorities described him as “an angry nobody who wanted to be remembered”.

The bloodshed began shortly after 9.30am when Kretschmer strolled into the school loaded up with 100 rounds of ammo.

After gunning down his former schoolmates and teachers, the killer was confronted by two police officers as he prowled the top-floor – within two minutes of the alarm being raised. They fired at him forcing him to flee.

But the executions did not stop there. Kretschmer shot a gardener working on the lawns of a psychiatric hospital opposite the school – pumping at at least six bullets into him.

At 11.15am he hijacked a car at gunpoint to flee the 1,000 police officers that were now on his trail. The driver escaped and Kretschmer ran to a car showroom where he murdered a salesman and a customer.

As he fled the building he came face to face with police and a gun battle broke out. Two officers were seriously injured in the melee before he killed himself.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel called for a national day of mourning. The European Parliament held a minute’s silence for the victims.

Merkel said: “It is unimaginable that in just seconds, pupils and teachers were killed. It is an appalling crime.”

Kretschmer, said to be a troublemaker who was known to police, was the son of a wealthy businessman. He was envied by some classmates over his family’s riches.

It is thought his pistol could have been one of 15 weapons belonging to his dad Joerg, a licensed gun holder.

On one website Kretschmer wrote: “What do I like about myself? Nothing. What do I hate about myself? Nothing.”

After the slayings police raided the family home and took his mother Ute in for questioning.

Psychologists were brought in to the school to help the shocked survivors.

Kretschmer’s murder spree was the latest in a string of school slayings in Germany.

In February 2002, a 22-year-old killed a headmaster and injured another person in training centre at Freising, near Munich.

The worst slaughter happened in April that year when expelled student Robert Steinhauser gunned down 16 people before turning his gun on himself.

In November 2006, a former student at a school in Lower Saxony went on the rampage injuring 37 people.

A boy of 17 was last night being quizzed by police after he threatened to bring a gun to school and shoot a fellow pupil in a row over a girl at a school in Shefford, Beds.