Breaking: Bellingham’s Sehome High School in lockdown
This is a developing story. Check back to bellinghamherald.com for updates.
To sign up for breaking news alerts, click here.
Sehome High School in Bellingham is currently in lockdown, according to a Western Washington University emergency alert sent shortly before 1:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Dec. 8.
The WWU alert said no other information was immediately available, but said the WWU community should avoid the area immediately surrounding the high school.
On its website, Bellingham Public Schools put up an alert that the high school was in a lockdown situation as of 12:55 p.m. on Wednesday.
The alert said students were inside the school with staff with the doors locked. It also said students and staff were taking safety precautions, and that law enforcement had been called. The alert also urged people not to come to the area.
A lockdown situation is initiated when there may be an immediate threat or hazard near or on the school campus, according to Bellingham Public Schools. Students and staff are moved or stay in their classrooms, sit away from sight lines of the doors or windows, and all doors and windows are locked and covered.
Classroom activities stop until the incident is over. The school office is closed and phones won’t be answered, according to information on Bellingham Public Schools’ website.
In a lockout situation, the exterior doors to the school are locked and students follow protocols for moving throughout the building. Friday’s lockout was modified because students stayed in the classrooms they were in as of 11 a.m. that day, and didn’t move throughout the building, Dana Smith, a spokesperson for Bellingham Public Schools, told The Bellingham Herald earlier.
A lockout is started when there might be a danger outside of the buildings or off campus, according to Bellingham Public Schools. Law enforcement advises the school district on which protocol to follow, Smith said.
This is the second lockdown/lockout situation at Sehome High School in less than a week, and the third overall for a Whatcom County high school.
Sehome previously went into a modified lockout for nearly two hours Friday, Dec. 3, because a 16-year-old male student brought a Glock-17-style airsoft pistol to school, The Herald previously reported.
The student was released to his parents and charges for possession of a dangerous weapon on school facilities were referred to the Whatcom County Prosecutor’s Office, according to a previous statement from Bellingham police.
A student who reportedly brought a weapon to Ferndale High School, forcing the school into a three-hour-long lockdown Wednesday, Dec. 1, turned himself in to law enforcement Thursday, Dec. 2, according to previous reporting in The Herald.
The weapon was seized and confirmed to be a BB gun. Ferndale Police said in a joint statement with the Ferndale School District that it expected to file criminal charges against the student, whose name has not been released, with the Whatcom County Prosecutor’s Office, The Herald previously reported.
The Herald has reached out to Bellingham Public Schools and the Bellingham Police Department for more information.
