Lockdown lessons learned in Saugus schools

SAUGUS – Police are still investigating the phone call that led to a lockdown at Saugus High School Friday, but they have learned one piece of valuable information: if necessary they can successfully lockdown the school.The high school was ordered locked down and was later evacuated after a gun threat was phoned into the School Administration building. Superintendent Keith Manville said the school was searched, nothing was found but the evacuation went like clockwork.”After the smoke cleared, we thought ‘Guess what? We know now we can evacuate the school if we had to.'”Manville credited Police Chief James MacKay and his officers for taking control of what could have been an ugly situation.”Once they got in there it was their show,” he said.Manville said when the threat came in, he immediately phoned High School Principal Joseph Diorio and, he added, there just happened to be a police officer already on hand. Manville said when Diorio told the officer of the situation, the officer called it in to the station.Manville said the police presence following his initial call to Diorio was swift and stunning. Police poured into the school, some searching for a weapon others working to evacuate the nearly 800 students.MacKay said police first worked to move approximately 300 students who were in the cafeteria. Freshmen and sophomores were sent to Blessed Sacrament church, while juniors and seniors were sent to the American Legion.”To be perfectly honest, as I watched the situation unfold the students did everything we asked them to,” MacKay said. “We were moving 800 students and the process took a long time and they were fully cooperative.”MacKay said he was sure many of the students were nervous, if not frightened, and felt under pressure largely because they were isolated in classrooms with little information.”The last class to go was more than two hours into it,” he said. “They were incredible. We talked to the teacher, they were all nervous but they were patient.”MacKay said there was a certain measure of security in knowing that the incident went smoothly and could be replicated if necessary.”We haven’t had to do anything like this before,” he said. “We watched, we talked about it and critiqued it. There were some minor things we’d change, but it really went well.”Students headed back to the school Monday where they went directly to fifth period, the class they were in when the building was locked down. Manville said that way they could pick up their belongings, which remained at the school over the weekend.From there, students met in small groups with their mentors for debriefing and later individual class assemblies were held to explain what exactly had happened.MacKay said what exactly happened is still under investigation.Manville said there has been some chatter that evacuating the school was a little over the top but he argued the call coming into the administration building ratcheted up the degree of seriousness. He said another reason the threat was taken seriously was that it came on the heels of the mall shooting in Omaha, Nebraska that left eight people dead and five injured at the hands of a 19-year-old gunman, who took his own life.