TROY — When gunfire rang out inside the Empire Bar on 5th Avenue in Lansingburgh at 1 a.m. Sunday morning, it created immediate panic, peril and chaos for terrified bar patrons who were forced to flee in stampede mode out the narrow front door.

“I just heard a bunch of pop, pop, pop, pop,” said one woman who was inside the bar when shots rang out. “We were trying to get out, and then we wanted to get out the back door and the owner said no. He’s not letting anybody get out through the back door. The next thing I know, the front door opened, we went to run, and I felt people stepping all over me.”

That trampled woman was still recovering Wednesday afternoon from broken ribs, a punctured lung and tubes that had been jabbed into her chest at the ER.

Another man was shot.

“I could hear a commotion and I turn around and that’s when I see a commotion,” said Jeffrey Jackson, owner of the Empire. “Then I just start hearing these pep, pep, pep noises and everybody get down. The bartender is telling me to get down. I don’t get down because I’m trying to figure out what’s going on.”

Jackson said he didn’t recognize the man with the gun and he states the incident has kept him up at night ever since it happened.

“It just makes you second guess things to be honest with you,” Jackson said.