Photo by Alan Olson Members of the Wheeling fire and police departments converge on West Virginia Northern Community College’s main campus Tuesday after a report of a suspicious package led to authorities checking for explosives.

WHEELING –A report of a suspicious package caused the evacuation of West Virginia Northern Community College’s Wheeling campus Tuesday afternoon, though police later determined the threat to be unfounded. And WVNCC wasn’t alone in that experience. The college was one of several similar threats made to several colleges in the region.

According to WVNCC spokesman David Barnhardt, the package was reportedly found near the college’s B&O building and reported to the police officer present. Wheeling Police searched the premises with bomb sniffing dogs and determined the report to have been unfounded. The all clear was given at around 3:20 p.m., two hours after Barnhardt said the initial report was made.

The building was evacuated and the nearby Market and 16th streets blocked off by police while dogs were brought on campus to search for explosives. The campus had several summer tour groups present, as well as faculty and staff.

WPD Public Information Officer Philip Stahl said the department had heard reports of other institutions of higher learning having received similar calls. In all, five such calls in the region were investigated — including at Belmont College, Ohio University Zanesville and Zane State, West Virginia University Parkersburg and Washington State Community College in Marietta, Ohio.

Stahl said that, as of Tuesday afternoon, Wheeling police were not involved in any investigations regarding a link between these incidents, and are solely handling the WVNCC case.

Belmont College spokeswoman Julie Keck said the college received its warning at about 2:30 p.m. and alerted everyone on campus.

“We evacuated. The sheriff’s department came,” she said, adding that the responders went through all of the college buildings. “We got the all-clear pretty quickly and allowed everybody to go back in the buildings once we got the all-clear from the sheriff’s department.”

Keck said officials got the all-clear at 2:56 p.m.

She said bomb threats are an unusual occurrence at the college, but the evacuation process went smoothly.

“Thankfully we’re in summer term, so we have less students on campus,” Keck said. “I don’t know exactly how many we had in the parking lot,” she said. “It was actually 911 that notified us, we’re still vague on the details.”

Chief Deputy James Zusack with the Belmont County Sheriff’s Office said law enforcement responded quickly.

Zusack said area bomb-detecting K-9 officers were “tied up” responding to West Virginia and Muskingum County, and the Belmont County office no longer has a bomb-detecting dog. He added that the department was confident in its search and detection methods without a dog.

He did not comment on any possible connection among the threats and said he did not know which agency would be investigating should a connection be suspected.

WVU-P Interim President Torie Jackson said a bomb threat was called in against the school to the Parkersburg Police Department.

Parkersburg Police Chief Matthew Board said the call initially came to them and they relayed to the 911 Center. Parkersburg Police did not send officers out to the campus, but were on standby to assist if needed.

Officers with the Wood County Sheriff’s Department and West Virginia State Police and local fire departments arrived at the school at 2:28 p.m., and the Caperton Center for Applied Technology building was evacuated and searched by officers and a bomb-sniffing dog in which nothing was found, Jackson said.

Wood County Sheriff Rick Woodyard confirmed they responded to a bomb threat call at the school.

“The area was checked and cleared,” he said. “It seems as the same MO as other calls that have been happening around the state.”

Washington State Community College Marketing Director Tim Brunicardi said that school’s threat was called into the Marietta Police Department between 2:30 p.m. and 3 p.m. and police immediately called officials at the college.

The threat was directed toward the second floor of the Arts and Sciences building which was evacuated and searched. Once that area was searched and cleared, the other buildings on campus were searched as a precaution, Brunicardi said.

According to a report from the Zanesville Times Recorder, Muskingum County Sheriff Matt Lutz said the MCSO, Zanesville Police Department and Zanesville Fire Department responded to campus after a bomb threat was called in to the ZPD dispatch center shortly before 2 p.m. Tuesday.

Lutz said Elson Hall was being searched by his office’s explosives dog, with a second K-9 unit in route from Columbus to help. Meanwhile, his office was attempting to trace the call the threat was made from to see if they could locate the source.

If the MCSO is able to find out who made the calls, felony charges are possible, Lutz said. Lutz added that there were as many as 60 such threats made around Ohio.

Alan Olson, Robert DeFrank and Brett Dunlap all contributed to this report.