An anonymous bomb threat disrupted some schools and government facilities across the state on Thursday, including Northwest College.

Law enforcement officials later said the threat — which claimed that hundreds of hidden pipe bombs and explosives would turn Wyoming “to dust” — did not appear to be a credible one. Authorities are investigating who sent the message.

Powell Police Chief Roy Eckerdt said the incident exposed some breakdowns in communication. For example, Eckerdt said both the police department and the Powell school district only learned of the threat when Northwest College officials forwarded on a warning they’d received from the Wyoming Office of Homeland Security.

When Eckerdt called down to Cheyenne for more information, he said he had to get in line between other chiefs and sheriffs, who apparently had heard about the threat the same indirect way.

“We’ve identified some communication failures that need to be addressed,” Eckerdt said. “In our ongoing crisis training and planning with the school district and the college, it’s a good exercise in how things need to flow. ... We’ll continue to take from it and grow.”

Leaders from Wyoming’s seven community colleges — who had gathered in Casper for a previously scheduled meeting — learned of the threat around 11:21 a.m., Northwest College President Stefani Hicswa said.

“The State of Wyoming has received an anonymous email with threats made against state facilities and schools across the state,” Guy Cameron, director of the Wyoming Office of Homeland Security, had written in an email to the director of the Wyoming Community College Commission. “Please take necessary precautions per your local protocols.”

Hicswa and NWC’s Incident Command Team decided to activate the emergency notification system at 12:23 p.m. to announce they were closing the campus and canceling all classes as a precaution.

“ALERT — this is not a drill,” the message read, directing college employees to “leave the campus immediately” and resident students to go to their residence halls.

NWC administrators initially told on-campus students to plan on eating dinner in their halls, but later decided it was safe to allow the meal to be served as normal in the DeWitt Student Center.

“The (emergency) procedure was followed — up until the time we received information that the same threat was made in seven states and was most likely not an imminent threat to our campus,” Hicswa explained, saying college officials got that information around 12:52 p.m.

Western Wyoming College in Rock Springs and Eastern Wyoming College in Torrington also decided to close their campuses and cancel their Thursday classes, while the other four community colleges and the University of Wyoming remained open.

A flight from Minneapolis to Cheyenne was temporarily unable to land while officials made sure the airport was safe.

As another illustration of the differing approaches, as Northwest College closed its Cody Center for the day inside the Park County Complex, the Park County Library remained open on the lower floor.

Similarly, some K-12 schools in the state went into lockdown and even canceled athletic practices, while school leaders in places such as Powell and Cody opted to remain vigilant, but open.

“We have been notified by the Wyoming Department of Education that there is no imminent danger to anyone as a result of the anonymous bomb threat reported earlier today. All schools will complete the school day as usual,” Park County School District No. 1 Superintendent Kevin Mitchell said in an afternoon message to parents, adding, “Thank you for your patience and understanding as we worked through this issue with very limited information.”

An image of the message later published by the online news site Sweetwater Now indicated someone identifying their self as “Archangel Michael” submitted the threat through a contact form on the state of Wyoming’s website.

“TODAY WYOMING WILL BE TURNED TO DUST!” the sender claimed. They wrote, also in all caps, that there were:

• 50 pipe bombs across official buildings in Cheyenne;

• 600 pipe bombs hidden in “multiple big cities and official government buildings in Wyoming”;

• 50 sets of explosives at the Cheyenne airport;

• 500 pounds of explosives hidden in 40 Wyoming schools — “and 10 schools have had their fire sprinkler systems filled with napalm”;

• and a “MOAB weapon of mass destruction thermobaric bomb” hidden in one of Wyoming’s three most densely populated places.

Chief Eckerdt said one of the positive things about Thursday’s incident was Northwest College’s quick formation of a response team and quick action.

“Five years ago, I don’t know that would have happened,” Eckerdt said, adding, “The college has been preparing to deal with violent issues, and because of those preparations, they were able to put those things into play rapidly.”

Hicswa said the message she heard from NWC employees and students was that they “very much appreciated the way the college handled the situation.”

“Our training has paid off,” Hicswa said. “I’m really pleased with our people. I didn’t need to be there, and everything happened as it was supposed to, so I’m really, really pleased with the process.”

Hicswa said she met with the Campus Security Coordinator for a debriefing Thursday afternoon after she returned from Casper. That debriefing identified no problems, she said.

Anthony Kellogg of Montana, a student at Northwest, said he was frustrated by the cancellation of Thursday’s classes.

“I have a 43-mile drive here daily,” Kellogg said, speaking from a college parking lot Thursday just after classrooms closed. “Me showing up to one class and then having to skip another one isn’t worth that gas.”

Kellogg, a five-year veteran of the military, said he thought the bomb threat was too general to be considered plausible.

He said he understood that college leaders must put a priority on students’ safety, “but I don’t like the idea that it’s a pretty good chance that it’s a hoax.”

Kellogg said he takes his education seriously, and missing a class last week means he will have to work harder this week.

He stressed that the real blame for his and other students’ inconvenience and other problems caused by the bomb threat lies squarely on the perpetrator(s).

“My having to miss a class because some punk kid ... didn’t wan’t to take a test, or they wanted to watch chaos, or they just wanted to put a prank out — it’s insulting; it’s demeaning,” Kellogg said. “There’s no reason I shouldn’t get mad, because now I’m losing out on part of my education, because somebody thought they’d have a little bit of fun.”

Cody Police Department spokesman John Harris released a Thursday statement saying the Department of Homeland Security and other state and federal agencies were investigating the threats. Harris reminded people to report any suspicious activity or behavior to law enforcement.

NWC classes and events resumed Friday.

Tribune photo by Ilene Olson