Students of EF International Language Campus are escorted to Alameda Park by their faculty and Santa Barbara police officers after evacuating their campus in downtown Santa Barbara due to a bomb threat on Thursday. The threat proved to be false.
Between Thursday and Friday, the Santa Barbara Police Department received four false bomb threats to the local community, local private schools, businesses and one involving the Santa Barbara Police Department.
Notre Dame School and a nearby school, EF International Language Campus, both received bomb threats Thursday, which led to evacuations at both private schools.
“We did indeed evacuate due to a bomb threat being called into the school, as well as multiple other locations in Santa Barbara,” Tim Flanagan, principal of Notre Dame School, told the News-Press in an email. “Police responded and swept the building. No evidence of a bomb was found here, or at any of the threatened locations.”
The top priority for EF International Language Campuses is always the safety of students, teachers and staff, a spokesperson told the News-Press in an email.
”Yesterday at approximately 2 p.m.,we heard from an anonymous caller who made a threat against our campus community, resulting in the temporary postponement of classes and the evacuation of facilities,” the spokesperson said. “We immediately contacted the authorities, who quickly arrived on campus.
“We also engaged a variety of support resources within the school and from our central organization, including staff experienced in safety and emergency protocols. Staff train on these protocols to ensure our ability to effectively respond in the unlikely event a threat materializes. We thank the Santa Barbara Police Department for their rapid and thorough response, as well as our school community for their patience during what ultimately proved to be a false report.”
The Santa Barbara Police Department said it takes these types of calls very seriously and in each case immediately responded, conducting thorough searches of the locations. Included in those searches were the use of bomb detection dogs and at times, evacuations. In each case, no bombs or other similar type devices were located, according to the department. It added that at this time, there’s no reason to believe these threats are credible.
These false bomb threats remain under investigation. Anyone with information is asked to call the Santa Barbara Police Department at 805-882-8900.
email: kzehnder@newspress.com
