Five people were fatally shot and two others were injured at the Annapolis offices of the Capital Gazette Thursday afternoon. Jarrod Ramos, a 38-year-old Laurel man, who had long carried a resentment for the publication, was charged with five counts of first-degree murder.

Many journalists in the state are reeling with the loss of colleagues and the attack on their industry as a whole.

“I just read the news with tears in my eyes because these people are family,” said Adrianne Flynn, career development director and ethics professor at University of Maryland’s Philip Merrill College of Journalism. “We instill in our students that in times of tragedy, it’s a journalist’s duty to tell the public what is happening. We buckle up and mourn later.”

That was exactly the response of Capital reporters, who, within hours of gunfire in their newsroom, released the Friday edition of the paper. The opinion section stated “Today we are speechless” and was dedicated to the five victims who lost their lives: Rob Hiaasen, Wendi Winters, Gerald Fischman, Rebecca Smith,­ and John McNamara.

“I worked with Rob and I knew John for 37 years,” said Milton Kent, a lecturer at Morgan State University, former Baltimore Sun reporter, and head of the MSU Spokesman. “We all, even in our worst moments, have to put aside whatever there is and get the job done. I can speak for John and Rob, they wouldn’t have wanted it any other way.”

Several regional reporters have weighed in on the tragedy and how it speaks to the journalism landscape as a whole. Maryland Matters editor Josh Kurtz wrote a poignant essay about hearing the news while standing in the Newseum in Washington, D.C.

“There’s a towering artifact dedicated to journalists who have been killed in the line of duty,” he says about the museum. “But usually you’re a foreign correspondent covering a war, not sitting at your desk. Journalism is a noble profession and it always will be.”

The Capital Gazette, which incredibly traces its origins back to 1727, has been owned by the Baltimore Sun Media Group since May 2014. Many Sun reporters assisted with getting the paper out today. University of Maryland’s Capital News Service has offered its newsroom up to Capital employees.

“We have sent so many kids to work there,” says Flynn, who has been at University of Maryland since 1999. “Rob has been an adjunct here for the past year and always said he wanted to help young journalists. He wanted to instill good values.”