Updated
By Sharyn L. Decker
Lewis County Sirens news reporter
Fords Prairie Elementary School in Centralia went into a modified lockdown after receiving a threatening phone call this afternoon.
School district spokesperson Ed Petersen said police are at the building on Harrison and Reynolds avenues.
Petersen said the call came into the school at 1:35 p.m. and he didn’t know exactly what was said, but described it as “kind of a robo-voice threat.”
The plan is for students to be released as usual and after school programs will go on as planned, Petersen said.
Petersen described the lock down as more of lock out.
Centralia Police Department spokesperson detective Patty Finch said officers, including with help from the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office and the Washington State Patrol, covered each school in Centralia this afternoon until students’ dismissal time.
“We’re attempting, still attempting, to trace the phone call,” Finch said at about 3:15 p.m.
Police have the number the call came from and the cell phone company involved is assisting them, she said.
“They said it possibly was a computer-generated call,” she said.
It was described as a male voice who said he had a gun, was on his way to the school and was going to shoot people and then shoot himself, according to police.
Students at all the schools by now have been released, without incident, according to Finch.
An increased police presence can be expected in the area around the school for the next day or two.
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