A Central Texas family’s annual spring break trip to Port Aransas turned violent after a 17-year-old opened fire on the group of beachgoers.

COPPERAS COVE, Texas — What began as an annual spring break tradition ended in tragedy for a Central Texas family, after a shooting on the beach in Port Aransas left five of their members injured— including one struck by eight bullets.

Seventeen-year-old Ernesto Josiah Castillo is now facing five counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon in connection with the shooting. He is being held on a $500,000 bond.

Stacy Ross, whose stepson was among those shot, spoke with 6 News about the night everything changed.

Ross said her family makes the trip to Port Aransas every spring break, staying in their RV on the beach at a family-oriented stretch of shoreline near one of the mile markers. This year, three families made the roughly four-and-a-half hour drive from the Copperas Cove area to spend the week together.

“It’s our annual trip,” Ross said. “We plan this trip every year during spring break. We take our kids and family, close friends. That’s really what our day consisted of, just having family time.”

Later, Ross said a large group of young adults — part of what she says locals call “pit parties” — made their way close to the family’s campsite. Law enforcement eventually dispersed the crowd, but the trouble wasn’t over.

Around 11 p.m., as Ross and others were heading to a nearby hotel to drop off food for extended family, she received a call from her stepdaughter.

“She was frantically crying, couldn’t really understand what she was saying, and she just said that there was a shooting, that somebody had been shot…my stepson was shot, my nephew was shot,” Ross recalled.

When Ross returned to the beach, she said it was chaos.

Ross said the shooting started after an altercation between two groups. The suspect drove away but then stopped near where the Ross family was gathered. Ross said older family members tried to get him to leave, but the situation escalated quickly.

“The driver decided to reverse and back up, and then the gentleman in the back seat decided to pull a gun out and just start shooting into our family’s crowd,” Ross said.

Five people were struck by gunfire. Some were treated and released within a day. Others were taken to the ICU, and one remains there. Ross’s stepson suffered the most severe injuries, sustaining eight gunshot wounds. The children had been brought in as Jane and John Does, with no identification on them, while the hospital was under lockdown.

“They were very limited on what they would tell us,” Ross said.

The three families are all business owners in the Copperas Cove and Lampasas areas. Ross says they essentially put their lives on hold and relocated to the coast for days to be near their loved ones. The community responded. A fundraiser raised nearly $14,000 to help cover lodging, food and expenses while the families stayed close.

“There’s really no words to even describe the gratitude that we have,” Ross said.

When detectives notified the family that a suspect was in custody, Ross said it brought some relief — but the emotional processing is still ongoing.

“There’s moments where you feel like ‘why’, or anger, or so many different emotions,” she said. “But the biggest part of it is just trying to stay in a better headspace and a positive outlook for our children.”

One victim remains in the ICU, with recovery and physical therapy expected to be a long road ahead.