Demolition of Parkland school shooting site begins

• Family members and former students watched on Friday as a large excavator began to rip the building apart.

What they're saying: "It puts a period on the end of the story," former MSD student Dylan Persaud told the Associated Press.

• Persaud lost seven friends and his geography teacher, Scott Beigel, in the 2018 shooting that took place about 50 miles north of Miami.
• "They should put a nice memorial there for the 17."

Frozen in time: For years, the three-story building loomed over campus as a haunting reminder of what happened there on Valentine's Day in 2018.

• Virtually everything inside — from wilted flowers to bullet-pocked walls and blood-stained floors — was left exactly how it was on that day.
• Jurors in the shooter's trial toured the building before Nikolas Cruz was sentenced to life in prison.

Victims' family members have participated in tours of the building with members of Congress and Vice President Kamala Harris over the past year.

• They've urged the elected leaders to enact school safety reforms and stronger gun laws.

What they're saying: Joanne Wallace, a former special education teacher at Stoneman Douglas, told the Miami Herald she wants to remember the victims "as they lived and not think too much about the way they died."

• "I'm just here to get another piece of closure and to honor … everybody that was lost."

What's next: Tony Montalto, whose 14-year-old daughter Gina was killed at the school, told NBC6 he wants Broward County Public Schools to replace the demolished building with a memorial.

• "It can't just be filled in with other parking spaces."