FREDERICKTOWN — Capt. Mike Kyle, a 30-year veteran of the Ashland County Bomb Squad, gave members of the Fredericktown police and fire departments, and Fredericktown school officials a wealth of information and a list of updated scenarios regarding school bomb threats at an informational meeting Thursday night.
“My job here tonight is not to make you guys bomb technicians,” Kyle said. Instead, the captain with the Ashland County Sheriff’s Department explained what protocol choices are available to both school personnel and first responders, in the event of a bomb threat.
Police Chief Jerry Day invited Kyle to Fredericktown to share his decades of experience with the group, who are charged with developing procedures for threats in Fredericktown. School Superintendent Dan Humphrey, and the Fredericktown principals listened and took notes while Kyle explained the proper methods of evacuation and search for an explosive device.
Kyle showed examples of Improvised Explosive Devices, or IEDs, to the group. Many of the devices were crude and made of household ingredients, but potentially deadly. The bomb expert told the group that a Butler County teen was killed only days ago by shrapnel from a homemade pipe bomb that had been built by youths to blow up a fort.
Stressing the unstable nature of many IEDs, Kyle told the group that any possible device should be handled only by bomb technicians. “The most important point if you come across any suspicious package,” he told the educators and first responders, “is don’t touch, don’t touch, don’t touch.”
Because there are only 19 bomb squads in the entire state of Ohio, teams such as the one in Ashland County must provide services for broad areas. “We can be here in under an hour,” Kyle said, urging the Fredericktown officials to call in the experts should anything suspicious ever be found.
After a threat is made, searching for a device that could be hidden or disguised as something obvious in plain sight, becomes the challenge. Kyle said this is when police, fire and school personnel work together. “I don’t know what is or isn’t supposed to be there,” Kyle told the school officials. Teachers and maintenance people are critical during a search, because they are in the classrooms and public areas of a school each day, and can spot things that do not belong. “You’re going to need the help of maintenance people and teachers,” Kyle said.
Humphrey said that school personnel participate in searches only on a volunteer basis. “We don’t force anybody to do it,” he said. Kyle said that working with police and fire officials, a more thorough search is possible when the school personnel are involved.
“Do a search using all your senses,” Kyle instructed. Anything that looks out of place is an immediate red flag and should be reported to the bomb experts, but things that smell out of place, with a chemical odor or an organic scent can also warn of an explosive device.
The expert recommended conducting searches in a room in either narrowing concentric circles, or a grid pattern to make sure the entire room is searched. He also said that it is important to search every level a room by dividing it eye-level to ceiling, then eye-level to waist-level, and finally waist-level to the floor.
If anything out of the ordinary were found, all Fredericktown first responders and school personnel would be immediately evacuated, so that the bomb technicians could address the situation.
Developing a procedure for handling bomb threats, is ultimately the responsibility of the school district. When to evacuate, where to take the students and when it is safe to reenter, are all parts of policy that are currently being developed in Fredericktown with input and cooperation from the police and fire departments.
“It always helps us to review our policies,” Humphrey said after the meeting. “I appreciate the cooperation between the fire department, emergency squad and police department.” Humphrey said the meeting was “interesting and informative.”
Day said he also learned from the meeting, and that the police department would work with the school as policy evolves. “We have always worked together with the schools, and we’ve had a good relationship with the schools,” Day said.
Fredericktown Fire Chief Scott Mast said that the officials would be using the knowledge they gained Thursday night to develop a plan. “We’re going to be having a meeting in the next couple of weeks, the fire department, the police department and the schools. We are going to come up with a plan based on the information that we attained tonight,” Mast explained.
Kyle said that a crucial part of deterring bomb threats, is prosecuting anyone, youth or adult, who makes any threat. Day agreed, and said that any threats against a school are taken extremely seriously, and prosecution would follow, even if the threat was a hoax.
