Waltham, Belmont School Bomb Threats: Police

WALTHAM, MA — Watham Public Schools evacuated all buildings Thursday, July 13, a school official confirmed after state police announced that three schools in Waltham reportedly received emailed bomb threats. A school in Belmont also received a threat but did not evacuate.

Although the threats specifically mentioned Waltham High School and Kennedy School, Pat Chadbourne, administrative assistant in the office of Waltham Superintendent Drew Echelson said everyone was evacuated as a precaution. She added that everyone was safe and accounted for.

Just after 11 a.m. parents of students and summer camp goers started to receive the Waltham Public Schools' reverse 911 alert.

"This is the Superintendent's Office at Waltham Public Schools calling to inform you that some schools in the District received emailed bomb threats. We are evacuating all students and staff in the summer programs. All students and staff are accounted for and are safe," the phone call said before listing evacuation sites so that parents could pick up their students at the assigned sites if they wanted. Though it also said students would be dismissed at the end of the normal program day.

What about Belmont?

Belmont Public Schools said they learned of an emailed bomb threat sent to Belmont High School administration at 9:45 a.m.

"School Administration immediately contacted the Belmont Police Department who then contacted the Massachusetts State Police," said Belmont Schools in an email to the Patch.

"Belmont Police, State Police, and School Administration conducted a visual inspection of Belmont High School. Upon completion of this inspection, and using State Police protocol, the threat was declared a low risk, and there was no evacuation of the building," said Belmont Superintendent John Phelan in an email to Patch.

Hoax?

The bomb squad have responded to both and are still investigating, according to police. But there is no word on whether this emailed threat was related to the email threat in Wareham earlier this week that turned out to be a hoax, as Patch reported.

School is out for the summer, but there are a number of summer programs that use the schools in both Waltham and Belmont for summer school as well as for summer camps. Last spring there was a series of robo call hoaxes in New England, but police at the time said their policy was to take all threats seriously.

Evacuation info for Waltham Schools:

Students attending programs at Stanley, Whittemore, and McDevitt have been evacuated to the Gosman Center Gym on South Street at Brandeis Univ. Students attending programs at FitzGerald, Northeast, Kennedy, MacArthur and Waltham High School have been evacuated to Bentley University and will be at the Adamian Center or Lindsay Hall.

Students in the Plympton Police Academy Program have been evacuated to the 911 Center at the Police Dept.

Updates to come.

RELATED: Wareham Schools Locked Down

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Photo of the Waltham Police Department by Jenna Fisher/ Patch