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Hoax disrupts schools

Police probe bomb threat

By Cati Keith 5 min read

Some area school districts evacuated students while others just swept their buildings after receiving bomb threat hoaxes Wednesday.

Hollidaysburg Area, Claysburg-Kimmel, Spring Cove and Bedford Area were among those receiving the threats.

State police sent districts an email earlier in the week warning about the bomb threat hoax.

Claysburg-Kimmel Interim Superintendent Brian Helsel said the Pennsylvania Criminal Intelligence Center also informed the district that there was no credible threat.

Helsel said the hoax had been circulating through other school districts earlier in the week.

Still when Claysburg-Kimmel received the threat Wednesday morning, officials contacted state and local police, which advised evacuating the buildings.

Claysburg wasn't the only district to evacuate.

At the time of an interview Wednesday, Ben Caldwell, director of human resources and transportation for Hollidaysburg Area School District, said that most of the students were back in their buildings.

State police did a full sweep of the buildings and nothing was found, he said.

"When we received the email threat, we could see about 10 other schools in the state that were sent the same message," Caldwell said.

Bedford Area School District received the same email threat about 9:27 a.m., but Superintendent Paul Ruhlman said it did not evacuate.

That was due to information received from state police at the beginning of the week that gave officials the sending address and message to look out for, which allowed them to know exactly what it was when they received it.

"We were able to see that it was a hoax because of the information sent to us from the state police," Ruhlman said.

Of course, they did do a visual scan of the district buildings, but he said that is something they do everyday.

"Even when it is a hoax, it is alarming," Ruhlman said. "It is a shame that we have actors causing this issue and their goal is to create chaos."

Started in Pittsburgh

Caldwell heard about the email threats circulating as early as Monday, with school districts in Pittsburgh being some of the first.

When Hollidaysburg received the email at 11:30 a.m., the police were called, "who then advised us to evacuate the buildings as a precaution," Caldwell said.

Because of the timing, student lunch periods were interrupted, with several classes evacuating from the lunch room.

Students had to wait to eat lunch until the building was cleared, and lunches that were already prepared but had sat out during the evacuation had to be thrown away and remade.

At C.W. Longer Elementary, a concerned resident who had been walking at Tiger Stadium went to a nearby Sheetz to get food for a diabetic student, as no one was allowed back into the school while the buildings were checked.

Rik responded

Helsel said once all the students, faculty and staff were evacuated from Claysburg-Kimmel schools, K9 officer Rik, trained in explosives detection, and his handler Sgt. Justin Bennett of the Blair County Sheriff's Office, were sent to scan the buildings.

Blair County Sheriff James Ott said the email hoax is a tragic situation that puts the community in a panic.

"It ties up resources for police and other departments that can be used elsewhere," he said.

While the office is blessed to have Rik and the K9 does a great job, the size of the school complexes can be a lot for one dog.

"I want to thank law enforcement, staff, students and parents for their cooperation and for allowing everything to run smoothly," Helsel said.

When the buildings were cleared, students proceeded with their schedules as normal.

Helsel said parents of students with special needs were called to let them know of the situation and given options for how they could respond.

There were two students, one from each building, who were picked up by their parents, he said.

"Anytime there is a change of routine, it alarms everyone. In this situation, people think of the worst case scenario even if it is a hoax," he said.

Helsel said situations like what happened on Wednesday are why districts have drills every month.

"Events like these allow us to evaluate what we did well, and what we can improve on," he said.

Helsel said school administrators and Greenfield Township police will meet today to go over everything.

"Everyone has a different perspective, and might see something differently than the rest," he said.

Helsel said when there are evacuations like this, students are not able to use the bathrooms.

When the bathrooms were cleared, staff members were able to take students who needed to use the facilities.

"It is a team effort and everyone came together -- they handled the situation well," Helsel said.

Warning helpful

Ruhlman is grateful for the warning provided by the state police because it allowed the district to prepare. School districts in general always have to look out for threats including cyberattacks.

Spring Cove School District had a similar reaction to the email it received.

The district's Facebook post said that it was already on high alert prior to receiving the message and was proactively sweeping the buildings.

Spring Cove was advised by outside law enforcement not to evacuate and continued to operate normally.

Paula Foreman of the Altoona Area School District said officials were aware of the situation at other area districts.

School operated as normal on Wednesday, while AASD staff continued to keep an eye out for anything unusual.

"It has put us on a heightened alert, and we let staff know to report any suspicious emails," Foreman said.

Mirror Staff Writer Cati Keith is at 814-946-7535.

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