Oak Harbor High School Evacuated After Threats

Oak Harbor, WA – The Oak Harbor High School was evacuated on March 2nd, 2017 after staff received a phone call from a subject around 11:00 a.m.,  stating there was explosives in the High School.   The subject also claimed they were going to arrive at the school at a certain time, armed with firearms.

School Officials notified Oak Harbor Police, who sent Officers to the school.  Due to the nature of the threats, the decision was made to evacuate the students from the  High School to another location.  The Oak Harbor School District notified surrounding schools of the threat and those schools were put into a lockout for a period of time.

Multiple Police agencies responded to the Oak Harbor High School, including several K-9 units to assist in searching the school for explosives.  The school was thoroughly checked and no problems were located.

In addition to the K-9 search of the school,  the Oak Harbor Police Department sent out emergency text and email notification to residents in the immediate area and the School District notified the community through email, texts and social media of the threats.

A subject on social media claimed responsibility for the threatening call made to the Oak Harbor School District  and Detectives from the Oak Harbor Police Department are  investigating the claim.

Unfortunately, Oak Harbor was one of several cities in the country who received this same type of call on Thursday.  This prank phone call resulted in multiple local resources tied up in a very time-consuming process of evacuating the school and searching the building.

Kevin Dresker, Chief of Police for the Oak Harbor Police Department wrote  “Our Local Law Enforcement partners provided invaluable assistance to our community to handle this situation safely and effectively.”