There was a bomb threat made against my company (and its office) sometime this evening. It's after 11pm and I have just received three calls from people at work saying the office will be closed until 1pm tomorrow afternoon while this matter is investigated.

I like to sleep in as much as the next guy, but this is some serious sh*t. This affects a large number of people, a large number of families in ways that can't possibly even be imagined at this time. I'll need those extra hours in the morning to catch up on the sleep I'll lose tonight because of this crap.

I'm sure our corporate security people will be busy tracing through logs and involving the policy and courts to obtain logs from upstream providers. I really hope they pinpoint the source of this threat, whether real or false. Of course I'm hoping for false.

Has anyone ever had a similar experience at their place of work?

Bruno

Working as a contractor for the military we used to get bomb threats all the time. Fortunately I only had to go through one of them, but before I started work there they had a large number of them.

Of course, with the large number of times it happened, people just took it as routine and a chance to break for an early lunch. Kind of sick, hunh? But nobody thought we'd ever really get bombed, even after 9/11. We just weren't a meaningful target. However, try to tell that to my wife!

My workplace had a bomb threat once, was the office complex, not someone from our office. Nothing was ever found.
But the more exciting stuff was the hostage situation right above my office on the 3rd floor. First it was, "Don't go outside, and don't be alarmed. The police have it under control." Then it was, "Leave the building immediately!" Go home and don't come back until tomorrow!"
So we all watched it on the news, a woman's estranged husband took her hostage, for the second time in two months. He was supposed to be getting a tracking device installed, instead he was heading to her office. 9 hours later it was over, but weird to see the window the SWAT team knocked out was right above my office.
Oh and the Travis County Sheriff said, "We failed to protect her, and now we must do our job and protect her." Ya think?

My wife works on Capitol Hill, and gets evacuated now and again. Sometimes for threats, sometimes for strange substances found in the mail. Her building was shut for quite some time after the anthrax.

It does throw their day off, but it's almost routine now. They have gas mask training every year or so, and a stash of masks in their office. Her office has a standing invitation to move into GPO as temporary office space while they deal with whatever happens. It also keeps us from using the Senate day care service (which is good and rather convenient, but not at the risk).

-jk

I'd love to see some statistics on how many bomb threats actually prove out with something being found. I bet it's infantesimal. We had about 4 of them in my high school alone.

I was at a Wyclef Jean concert on the PSU campus back in 1998 when a bomb threat was called in. The crowd was informed that there was a threat, and people were welcome to leave. Most, including me and my friends, stuck around, and Wyclef and the band kept playing for as long as they could before University suits stepped in and started shutting things down. I didn't feel like I was in danger at the time. The way I see it, if someone wants to kill a lot of people, they're generally not going to call in and announce it. I think running from threats like this sets a bad precedent, especially now that terrorism has become a part of our lives. Being terrified of each and every threatened action is no way to live.

Yeah, I agree. What's wrong with these people?! They called the wrong video card company. If anyone deserves a bomb threat it's nvidia.

You know, with your description of the office being closed so long because of it, I'm picturing a whole "office space" thing happening. Take any red staplers lately?

Maybe it was directed at ATI's driver UI writers.

I'd love to see some statistics on how many bomb threats actually prove out with something being found. I bet it's infantesimal.

Same, at least now the IRA have gone all quiet, with statistics on how many bombs are actually preceded by threats. Again I bet it's infinitesimal.

Peter

Sneaky correction.