Petersburg’s school buildings and surrounding area were on lockdown for over an hour Tuesday afternoon after police received a report of a person with an AR-15 gun and multiple magazines in a school bathroom.
The Petersburg Police Department, Alaska Wildlife Troopers and U.S. Forest Service Law Enforcement responded and secured the area.
Officers found no real threat on the premises and determined it was a false report.
“I’m sure people were alarmed, but rest assured it’s safe and we’re allowing employees back,” Police Chief Jim Kerr said outside the school Tuesday. “The investigation continues now.”
Staff and students took cover around 2:00 p.m., running through the district buildings and hiding in locked rooms. Petersburg’s school year doesn’t start until September, but teachers were already working and some students were on campus registering when officers arrived and evacuated everyone from the buildings.
Incoming Petersburg High School sophomore Brody Whitethorn said she was in the school commons when officers ran in with guns, telling them to get out.
“I had to run through the district office all the way into the elementary school and hide in a room with a bunch of people,” she told KFSK in a secured area outside the school during the lockdown. “It was crazy.”
Whitethorn said the district office was packed with dozens of people, and she ran with teachers and kids of various ages.
Officers searched the school district premises and found no suspect or evidence of a gunman. Kerr told a group of people waiting outside that it was safe to return to the campus around 3:20 p.m.
He said the investigation remains ongoing as law enforcement looks into who made the false report, and why.
“We’re still going to investigate, see who called it in [and] find out what the motive behind it was,” Kerr told KFSK.
In an update Wednesday, Kerr said the police department confirmed the phone number that placed the false report was an out-of-state caller, but the exact location “cannot be traced.”
He said the FBI has been notified.
This story was updated Wednesday, Aug.27 at 5:00p.m.
