At age 76, Librescu was among the 32 people who were murdered in the Virginia Tech shooting. On April 16, 2007, Seung-Hui Cho entered the Norris Hall Engineering Building and opened fire on classrooms. Librescu, who taught a solid mechanics class in Room 204 in the Norris Hall during April 2007, held the door of his classroom shut while the gunman attempted to enter it and yelled to his students to escape through the windows. While the shooter tried to nudge open the door, Librescu managed to prevent him from entering until most of his students had escaped through the windows. After kicking open the window screens, the students successfully escaped. Some suffered leg injuries while landing on the ground two floors below, others survived after landing on the shrubbery just below the window and then ran either to some ambulances pulling up or to the nearest bus stop. Librescu was shot four times through the door, including one through his wrist watch, freezing time. Of the 23 registered students in his class, Minal Panchal, a grad student from Mumbai, India, was the only student who lost her life, while two others, who were injured while taking cover in a corner, made it out alive. It was then noted that after the armed aggressor forced his way inside the room, he was enraged after the majority of students escaped. Before leaving the room, Cho confronted Professor Librescu and student Panchal who were lying on the ground next to the door and fatally shot them in the temple.