More than 300 schools in Northern Ireland received bomb-threat emails on Monday, prompting precautionary closures and evacuations as police treated the messages as a hoax and reported finding nothing untoward.
Shortly before 9 a.m. is when the message came through channels outside the schools’ normal secure C2k network.
“Today, with Allah’s permission, we will carry out a series of planned terrorist attacks across the country,” the email said. “What you experience today is only the beginning.”
The emails claimed that the government would surrender its authority and that Sharia law would be established, and ended with “Allahu Akbar.”
According to the PSNI, up to 300 schools in Northern Ireland had reported receiving the same threatening email, with similar emails believed to have reached schools elsewhere in the United Kingdom. The message triggered internal emergency procedures, notifications to the police, and the Education Authority.
Most schools remained open, although some closed or evacuated pupils as a precaution.
In a number of schools parents were asked to collect children immediately. The main effects were temporary loss of teaching time, parental anxiety and the diversion of police and education-authority resources into checking sites and managing communications.
“I want to absolutely condemn the actions of those who sought to disrupt our education system today by issuing threatening emails to our schools.” Paul Givan, Northern Ireland Education Minister said in a statement.
Police assessed risk to the public as low. Enquiries were continuing. “Checks have not, at this time, resulted in anything untoward,” the PSNI said.
Monday’s incident fits a recurring pattern of hoax communications targeted at schools in Northern Ireland and Scotland, but differs in scale and wording.
In May this year at least six schools and some businesses in County Antrim, including Randalstown, Ballycraigy and Antrim town, received an email claiming pipe bombs had been planted and gun and knife attacks would follow.
Nine schools in Strabane, Ballycastle, and Enniskillen received similar threatening emails in March last year and several closed as a precaution. In 2016, a series of phone calls, including automated robocalls claiming explosives had been planted at primary schools, prompted evacuations. Police found nothing untoward in each case and treated them as hoaxes.
Assistant Chief Constable Ryan Henderson said in a statement:
“We take incidents of this nature very seriously and we understand the concern in the community, not to mention the disruption it has caused in some school communities and for students and parents,” he said. “Our enquiries are ongoing, however, at this stage we consider risk to the public as low.
He added, “We will continue to liaise with schools impacted and have been working closely with the Department of Education and the Education Authority this morning to provide reassurance.”
What distinguishes the current event from previous ones is the explicit reference to Sharia law and the sign-off “Allahu Akbar,” which is more specific than most earlier generic bomb threats documented in the countries.
Similar Islamist-styled wording appeared in a smaller incident last week in East Lothian, where nurseries and primary schools received a bomb-threat email during the school holiday.
The threats message is being treated by authority as a hoax, although enquiries were continuing.
