Dive Brief:
- An alert on Harvard's website and a tweet Monday morning cited "unconfirmed reports of explosives" as the reason for evacuations at four campus buildings.
- The buildings involved are Science Center, Thayer, Sever and Emerson, and Monday morning finals have been canceled.
- University and Cambridge police are investigating, and state K9 units and bomb squads are on the scene.
Alert: Unconfirmed reports of explosives at four sites on campus: Science Center, Thayer, Sever, and Emerson. Evacuate those buildings now.
— Harvard University (@Harvard) December 16, 2013
Dive Insight:
As incidents like the Virginia Tech shooting in 2007 have taught administrators, every potential threat to the lives of students, faculty and staff have to be taken seriously. This could just be a tasteless finals prank, but the university's speedy response is likely to save lives in the event it turns out to be more.