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Hoax calls shut BU buildings, Comm. Ave.
By bostonzest on Fri, 11/18/2016 - 8:53am
Outside the scene. Photo by Zef.
Police, including the bomb squad and a SWAT team, arrived around 8:30 a.m. at 771 Commonwealth Ave. The building was emptied and the street shut to both pedestrians and motorists.
BU Today reports police were forced to act after getting what turned out to be hoax calls about a man claiming he was strapped into a booby-trapped room in the building.
The street was re-opened at 9:26 a.m.; firefighters and EMTs were released from the scene.
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Comments
There is a bit going on on
There is a bit going on on twitter:
https://twitter.com/WBUR/status/799615829667184640
https://twitter.com/terbril/status/799616092440293378
https://www.reddit.com/r/boston/comments/5dmiqr/bomb_threat_at_bu_union/ says its a bomb thread quoting College Sources.
Yikes.
Looks like I dodged a bullet, so to speak. My outbound B-Line ride took me through there just after 8:30 AM, so I missed the excitement. Any word on what it was, or wasn't?
On a happier note, the Packard's Corner debacle from yesterday has been resolved.
AFAIK, the street closure
didn't affect the Green Line. The MBTA didn't send out an alert, and I found nothing on their web page.
BDC is now reporting this was a hoax
http://www.boston.com/news/local-news/2016/11/18/authorities-investigate...
Are midterms scheduled for this week?
No
To answer your question - BU mid-terms are long over. The kids (as well as others on college campuses all over the area) are getting ready for a much-needed Thanksgiving break.
Memories
Ah, the old Stone Science chemistry building. Down in the subsubbasement there was a room filled with ancient chemicals. Toxins, mutagens, explosives, you name it. Nothing was ever thrown out. Then one day in the early 80s there was a rainstorm of Biblical proportions. The rushing groundwater found a crack, and the room filled with water. Labels were soaked off jars leaving a bobbing mass of horrible toxic containers now unidentifiable. There were in that mass many many gallons of flammable solvents and many jars filled with sodium and potassium metal in mineral oil. It would have taken only one compromised jar to release a cloud of hydrogen and heat and sparks in that confined, fuel-rich space.
We stood across the street in macabre fascination as a team from Clean Harbors waded in and began bagging the mess while a BU spokesperson calmly told a TV reporter on camera that there were absolutely no dangerous chemicals involved.
There's rumors of dangerous chemicals
Jim Hacker - Yes Minister