BOMB Threat

[Andykev]

My son attends a high school near our local community college, Diablo Valley College. Over the weekend, there was a "bomb" threat, which was deemed credible. Here is the story, then my take on it:

"Bomb threats force DVC campus to stay closed for a second day

CONTRA COSTA TIMES

Diablo Valley College's Pleasant Hill campus will remain closed for a second day Wednesday in response to two bomb threats.

Bomb squad officers on Tuesday searched the campus and did not find any bombs, but classes won't resume until at least Thursday morning.
"We just feel like it's the most cautious thing to do based on that there's still a threat," said Diablo Valley College spokeswoman Chrisanne Knox. "We know the campus is very secure right now, and we're confident of that, but we want to investigate further."

Police in Concord and Pleasant Hill received two "unspecified" bomb threats against the DVC campus at 10 p.m. Sunday and 6 a.m. Monday. Knox said bomb threats at the campus are not unusual during midterm exams, which are going on at DVC.

Classes were canceled Tuesday morning after bomb-detection dogs flagged two sites, a locker by the former bookstore in the center of campus and a snack bar. The Walnut Creek police bomb squad later denoted the suspect locker and discovered it was empty. The snack bar was also cleared of any bombs.

About 22,000 students attend Diablo Valley College, including around 16,000 who frequent the Pleasant Hill campus. Police cordoned off interior parking lots Tuesday but students still milled around some of the outer lots, looking for information about the threat.

"Unfortunately, I'm not surprised," said Lafayette resident Derek Matsui, 21, who was on his way to a psychology class when he heard of the bomb threat.

"It makes me angry that there are so many attacks and threats upon the education community. All it does is deny education opportunities to a lot of us."

Martinez resident Daniel Sabatini, 25, said he could not afford to miss a class in his rigorous math course.

"This is hurting me," Sabatini said. "And it's probably because of someone who didn't want to take their midterms or some nut job."

Not everyone was as disappointed.

"Good, 'cause I didn't do my homework," one student said before speeding off.

In Clayton, police evacuated Diablo View Middle School after a bomb threat was received there at 1 p.m. Tuesday. A police spokeswoman said students waited in a parking lot until they were released to their parents at the school day's end. She said officers and bomb-detection dogs searched the campus and found nothing suspicious as of Tuesday afternoon."



This is my take: no joke. Used to be a gag in the old days to phone in some bogus threat just because some jerk student didn't study for mid terms. Now, the FBI, BOMB SQUAD, and LOCAL POLICE, not to mention the displacement of 22, 000 students. This costs a ton of money. So, IF they catch the "suspect" (and I suspect the suspect is a student), they should go to jail, and pay for their deed. This is NOT the day and age to pull the fire alarm to extend recess:rage: :rage:

 

[Marc Chevalier]

It's like the famous example of yelling "fire!" in a crowded theater -- especially when arsonists are threatening the area. As you say, not funny by any means. I consider this a serious offense.

.

 

[jamespowers]

I say we cane 'em .

Regards,

J

 

[Lady Day]

There was a bomb threat at my high school in 96'. They took all 2000 of us across the street to the track. I kept thinking, if its a real bomb, wouldnt being only 20 feet away not be a good thing?

LD

 

[carebear]

There was a bomb threat at my high school in 96'. They took all 2000 of us across the street to the track. I kept thinking, if its a real bomb, wouldnt being only 20 feet away not be a good thing?

LD

Kinda depends on the bomb.

Of course, people didn't faint at the merest wisp of potential but highly unlikely danger back then either.

 

[Roger]

Agreed Andy. I think a couple years ago someone phoned a bomb threat to an airline because they were going to miss the flight. It was never a funny joke and should always be punished with jail time.

 

[K.D. Lightner]

I used to work for the County of San Diego. I could not begin to tell you the number of times bomb threats were called in and we had to leave the building. One time, the search for a bomb lasted so long, we were told to go home.

In one case, there was a bomb threat every other day at one County site; the caller turned out to be a disgruntled employee.

We had reading materials at our desks on what to say to engage someone who called in with a bomb threat.

karol

 

[Phil]

as much as I do enjoy the practical joke every now and then, there is a key to those jokes. It's even in the title, "practical". Releasing 3 pigs and painitng 1,2, and 4 on them is funny; a bomb threat is not.

 

[happyfilmluvguy]

There had been a lot of stink bomb threats at my high school. I haven't had the pleasure of hearing the fire alarm going off unintentionally. If it was an alarm that was pulled, their fingerprints are there. I doubt a kid will know to wear gloves to not leave fingerprints.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Bomb threats in schools aren't a new phenomenon at all. When I was in high school in the late '70s, we used to have them quite often -- and usually they cropped up right around exam times. We'd get evacuated down to a nearby Congregational church building, which would be turned into a massive study hall for the occasion, and we'd sit and read for however long it took the police to search the school building. And then we'd go back and finish out the day.

They finally did catch one kid who was responsible for the threats -- and he ended up getting suspended for a month, with no actual criminal charges being pressed. Back then it was viewed more as an irritation than anything else, but times have changed...

 

[scotrace]

Indeed they are not new. We had them in '69-'70. But the threats then were always blamed on "crazies," of which there seemed no shortage at the time. We also called them "bomb scares."

 

[Atomic Glee]

There was a suspicious package found on the sidewalk near my building a couple of months ago - turned out to just be a bag full of electronics parts, but you can understand the suspicion. Fort Worth PD bomb squad took care of it. They handcuffed the front door of our building, so we couldn't get out into harm's way. Pic of the event:

 

[carebear]

This is what gets me.

Assuming there aren't stray wires, chemical stains or smells or something protruding that don't show in the picture, that isn't a "suspicious package", it is a "lost bag". You'll never hear the person who reported it or the police who responded explicate whether it truly fit any of the known IED criteria. It was simply a bag lying on the ground and some ninny freaked out and called the cops.

Prior to 9/11 it would have been picked up by a passerby and turned in to building security who would have opened it to see if they could find ID. And, just like this one and statistically every other lost bag in the country, it would be found to not be a bomb.

This unnecessary knee-jerk panic we go through now that totally ignores reason and perspective is annoying.

This sort of thing isn't a triumph of Homeland Security or Public Safety, it's a waste of time and resources. Who needs to go to terrorist bomb school, just stuff bulky objects (books say) into fanny packs and drop them in public. No crime is committed (except maybe littering) yet you can shut down businesses for hours and totally disrupt people's lives.

The general public in this country needs to be better educated on this stuff, we are being ill-served by the authorities and media. 0-percent risk is not an achievable or desireable goal for life.

 

[Atomic Glee]

This is what gets me.

Assuming there aren't stray wires, chemical stains or smells or something protruding that don't show in the picture, that isn't a "suspicious package", it is a "lost bag".

I think the reason the police were called is that somebody either peeked inside (or, perhaps, could see inside a bit at first), and saw electronic parts and wires. That's what the police said afterwards prompted the call, and indeed, the bag was filled with electronics parts and wires.

 

[Dinerman]

My High School had a bomb threat about two weeks ago. It turned out to be a hoax, but we had to stand in the parking lot for two hours while they sent the bomb sniffing dogs in.

 

[Baron Kurtz]

The building on campus where my lab is located has a policy for the labs that when a cardboard box is empty we should leave it in the corridor for the janitors to pick up in the evening and send for recycling. I wonder if anyone's ever reported those.

"Bomb scares" are quite common on every campus, it seems. Funnily enough the only one i remember here was so that someone could get out of an exam for some absurdly easy course (i don't remember which, but it was along the lines of elementary shaving for adult males or some such idiocy).

bk

p.s. elementary shaving for adult males is not a course taught at Purdue or any other university to the best of my knowledge. It is made up and absurd; a poke at the kind of useless courses which are taught by universities these days.

 

[LizzieMaine]

There's one bomb scare I remember that was actually *applauded* by most of the town.

We used to have a fish-meal processing plant here, where offal from the local canneries would be boiled down into fertilizer -- and it produced a stench which you could literally see hanging in a cloud over the city. As soon as you hit the town line, you'd start rolling your windows up, and you'd see people walking down the street with handkerchiefs over their noses. It was truly horrible.

One brutally hot August afternoon I was at my desk at the radio station, with the windows closed tight against the smell, when the phone rang. "THERE'S A BOMB AT SEA-PRO. PASS IT ON." So, I did the only thing I could do -- and I called the Sea-Pro office and told them about the call -- and they told me they'd gotten the same message and were in the process of shutting down the plant to investigate.

Well, there was no bomb. But the stink was gone for the rest of the day, and there was even a tongue-in-cheek editorial in the local paper *thanking* whoever called in the threat for that bit of relief.

How times have changed...

 

[carebear]

I think the reason the police were called is that somebody either peeked inside (or, perhaps, could see inside a bit at first), and saw electronic parts and wires. That's what the police said afterwards prompted the call, and indeed, the bag was filled with electronics parts and wires.

Great, a bag of disconnected parts in an area, I assume, with business offices, containing numerous computers and such, that would have techs working in them who carry tools and spares in, say, smallish blue bags?

At the point the bag had been picked up and opened (I doubt the discoverer laid prone and peeked through a crack) it either was a bomb and would have detonated immediately on pickup or assuradly before the square had time to be cleared/police called or it wasn't, either way a second look could have been taken without additional risk by the initial discoverer. Heck, they probably dropped it once the OMG! A BOMB! panic hit them.

If they had loked and not seen actual explosives or a coherent device of some kind they could have then turned it in to a building security office and everyone would have gone on with their day.

For the record, I'd like to report a suspicious dumpster behind Radio Shack and containers of an unknown plastic explosive-like substance in yellow tubes at Toys-R-Us.

 

[Riposte3]

...yet you can shut down businesses for hours and totally disrupt people's lives.

Not only people's lives and businesses, but this ties up significant resources that may be needed elsewhere.

For example, back in 2002 during the Anthrax letter scares, someone found an abandoned box in our campus library. There were traces of white powder found near the box. The library, neighboring student center, and several nearby dorms were evacuated. Portions of at least 3 roads were closed. In addition to campus and town police, the state police, and FBI were called in. The state HAZMAT unit was called in. The fire department had multiple trucks standing by. I was there as part of the town Rescue Squad. The campus Rescue Squad had one ambulance there (they only have two), and we had 3 ambulances, a command vehicle, and our heavy crash truck on scene. This gave us about 16 members on scene.

All of these resources were kept on scene for about 10 hours, unavailable for any other emergencies that might have happened.

In the end? The box was filled with powdered laundry detergent and loose wires. Somebody without a clue, who thought it would be a "funny" joke.

-Jake

 

[carebear]

Yet, rather than calling for calm and the use of a little rationality in response these over-reactions are applauded.

"If it saves one (child/life/tree?) it was worth it" is only valid (such as it is) if there was a realistic chance one would be lost.

A whole cardboard box full of anthrax spores? Manufactured (with some difficulty) by whom, in that quantity, just to attack a college?

The real anthrax attack was conducted, ineffectively, against an actual national target and involved much smaller amounts.

There are realistic threats and then there's freaking out. I just wish the informed (who should know better) weren't leading the charge.