School lockdown ends peacefully
Published 10:01 am Wednesday, February 3, 2016
- Deputy Randy Weigardt, left, responded with Ciko, who searched the area around the school.
LONG BEACH — Law enforcement officers helped evacuate Ocean Beach School District students on Wednesday afternoon, following a lockdown that was initiated in response to a phone threat. It does not appear that anyone was harmed during the roughly two-hour incident.
Shortly after 1 p.m., officers from several agencies responded to the Long Beach Elementary, Hilltop and Ilwaco High School campuses.
At Long Beach Elementary, responders from Pacific County Sheriff’s Office, Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, Washington State Patrol and Washington State Parks surrounded the school. Long Beach city crews and volunteer firefighters helped block the roads in the surrounding neighborhood. According to scanner traffic, officers also patrolled the area around Ocean Park Elementary. Long Beach Police led the incident response.
Starting around 1:45 p.m., responders from LBPD and PCSO entered the OBSD administrative building to confer with Superintendent Jenny Risner. Outside, officers worked with city crews to plan to release students.
As news of the incident spread, parents gathered a block away from Long Beach Elementary and waited in the rain for students to be released. Officers turned away a handful of parents who tried to walk past police barricades. A PCSO deputy and his police dog, Ciko, circled the elementary school.
District officials announced at 2:45 p.m. all campuses were safe, and students would be released. In Long Beach, officers, city workers and school staff escorted some students to buses, then escorted parents into the building to pick up the remaining children around 3 p.m.
Most students and officers had cleared the scene by about 3:30 p.m.
As of Wednesday afternoon, there were few details about the nature of the threat, and school and police leaders were not available for comment.
This is a developing news story. New information will be added as it becomes available.