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A bomb threat at a UCLA recreation center on Wednesday night prompted a police response and the evacuation of several residence halls on campus, reports the L.A. Times.
The university sent out an alert at about 10:00 p.m. about a bomb threat at the Sunset Canyon Recreation Center. According to a statement by UCLA, many of the students affected gathered at Drake Stadium as emergency responders investigated the report. "No suspicious device was found. At 12:20 a.m. on Thursday, residents were allowed to return to all residence halls at UCLA," said the statement. It adds that police are still investigating the situation.
Captain Bob Leinweber of UCLA campus police told the Times that the threat was phoned in to the campus police station's dispatch center, and that more than a dozen residence halls were evacuated as a result.
Some people captured the scene and shared it on social media:
While there was confusion among the students, some also described the evacuation scene as being calm and collected. “It was really hectic cause no one really knew what to do or where we were going,” student Lemoine Dillon told the Times. "A lot of people are on their phones. It's pretty relaxed," Josh Harmon, a pre-college student, told Rueters.
The incident received some international attention, as Real Madrid and Manchester United (two popular soccer teams from Spain and England, respectively) are currently using UCLA's training facilities to practice for their upcoming pre-season matches in the U.S. International Business Times reports that neither team was present when the bomb threat took place.
