Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge received a bomb threat that was called into 911 around 10:30 a.m. Monday, a spokesperson said. The university sent an emergency text alert ordering the campus to be evacuated, and police were still clearing many of the buildings on campus Monday evening. No explosives have been discovered so far.
“We’re checking the residence halls first,” spokesperson Ernie Ballard said.
Ballard said one of the residence halls, Evangeline Hall, was cleared so the 6,000 students who live on campus would have somewhere to go. He said the investigation is ongoing, so the school has not yet determined if the threats were false. He said he does not know how many of the university’s 29,000 students and 2,700 faculty and staff members were on campus, and that he did not know of any prior LSU campus evacuations larger than Monday’s.
LSU mass communications junior Kevin Thibodeaux said he was on campus when the text alert reached his inbox at 11:32 a.m. He walked into a building and someone told him the campus was being evacuated.
“Most people are taking it not too seriously,” Thibodeaux said. “The traffic over here is probably the craziest part.”
Thibodeaux said many people were stuck in traffic near Tiger Stadium immediately after the evacuation was ordered.