‘A fear that we have every day.’ Bellefonte high school evacuated after phony shooting threat
Dozens of alarmed family members converged Wednesday on the Bellefonte Area High School, where a phone call that claimed multiple students were shot proved to be part of a hoax that affected schools throughout the state.
The emergency response at the high school that’s home to nearly 900 students, along with another 70-80 staff members, began at about 9:15 a.m. Tuesday.
All schools in the rural district were placed on lockdown as police entered and began clearing the high school but found no evidence of an active threat or shooting.
Similar phone calls were made to schools throughout the state, the Pennsylvania State Police wrote in a statement. Described as “computer generated swatting calls,” all were found to be phony.
Frightened students made unnerving phone calls to their guardians, who descended en masse on the school where at least 70 police officers from nearly every agency in Centre County were on hand.
‘It can happen here too’
Vernon Monsell, a grandfather of two BAHS students, said he received a hysterical phone call from his daughter while he was in a meeting in State College.
He immediately left after she told him what was reported, adding his truck reached 110 mph as he drove on Interstate 99. Monsell said his granddaughters were “OK, but a little shook up.”
“You never think it’s going to happen, but anything anymore you just don’t know,” Monsell said before he choked up and paused. “... I just want to give them a hug. It’s emotional probably for everybody after everything that’s happened in the country and the other schools. It can happen. It can happen here too.”
Six people were killed by a former student Monday at a small, private Christian school just south of downtown Nashville. The massacre was the latest in a series of mass shootings in a country that has grown increasingly dismayed by bloodshed in schools.
Emotions appeared to run the gamut as BAHS students were evacuated from the building and reunited with their loved ones. Some talked about life and laughed, while others gave their children hugs that lasted more than a minute.
One tearful student said “I’m scared” as she hugged and walked with a man. “It’s OK,” he responded with tears in his eyes. Several others also wiped away tears as they began to make their way home.
One woman, who asked that she not be identified publicly, said she received a phone call from her daughter while she was still in the school.
The sophomore asked her mother if she knew what was going on — she did — before telling her “I just want you to know that I’m safe.” She paused for more than 10 seconds before speaking again as tears welled in her eyes.
“With everything going on this week, this really hit home,” she said. “I hate to say this, but I’m almost not surprised because it’s just happening everywhere. Surprised but not surprised that it can happen in a small place like Bellefonte. Right now, being here and having her contact me to have to say that she’s safe and go through this, that’s where the emotion comes from.”
She later added: “I know that she’s been well aware as a tenth grader of all of the things happening with threats and gun violence and things with schools and with youth. I just need to be here for her and just make sure that I’m strong for her.”
Praise for students, faculty in response
Borough police Chief Shawn Weaver — who has two sons that attend the high school and has coached dozens of other students — described the emergency call as “surreal.”
The longtime chief who has worked as a police officer for more than two decades said he’s responded to similar threats of violence throughout his career, but never “something of this magnitude.”
“There’s no training that can actually put you into the event,” Weaver said. “We try to simulate as much as we can in our trainings to make it as lifelike as possible, but I can tell you going down the hall when I was in there today and heard someone yell some loud commands, that gets your heart pumping a little bit.”
Officers worked for about 90 minutes to clear the building, going classroom by classroom. No shots were fired by any officer, Weaver said.
He and Bellefonte Area School District Superintendent Tammie Burnaford praised students and faculty for their “textbook” response. Burnaford said the phone call that notified her about the threat was “absolutely one of the last calls that I would ever want to have.”
“We notified parents as quickly and as often as we could,” Burnaford said. “As horrible as this has been, it worked like clockwork. ... Our students and staff and our parents were amazing today.”
Students were evacuated to the nearby Rogers Stadium. They waited there until they could be reunited with family members and were dismissed for the day. Counselors were available Wednesday and are expected to be on-hand Thursday as well.
Jodi Williams first heard about the reported emergency from her son, who called after running to Rite Aid across East Bishop Street. Williams said she could “tell the fear in his voice.”
“I was scared. I didn’t know what I was going into, but I was going,” Williams said. “(My son) is not a scared kid. He plays football and he’s track and he’s very athletic and has that persona about him, but I could hear the fear in his voice. I was scared for him. With the Nashville shooting and those sorts of things, it’s all very raw. These whole few years have been very raw. It’s been far enough away from us that we’re not impacted by it so to speak physically, but now it’s right in our face. The emotions are really high.”
Burnaford, like Williams, said she knows the phone call was a “very, very scary moment” for parents and students. Classes are scheduled to resume Thursday.
“It happens everywhere. It is a fear that we have every day,” Burnaford said. “But we work as a district to keep every student and staff member as safe as we possibly can. We have talked with parents about the things that have happened elsewhere. The kids talk through that. It is always a concern.”
This story was originally published March 29, 2023 at 10:12 AM.