Parents, students reeling after active school shooter hoax
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Updated: 8:42 PM EDT Mar 29, 2023
YEAH, IT CERTAINLY IS. SHANNEN, AS MANY OF YOU KNOW, I AM A PARENT TO A JUNIOR HERE AT OAKLAND CATHOLIC HIGH SCHOOL. AND I CAN TELL YOU IT WAS QUITE DIFFICULT TO GET A CALL FROM HER TODAY AS SHE WAS WHISPERING, HIDING INSIDE HER CLASSROOM. AND EVEN KNOWING THAT THIS WAS A HOAX, IT IS STILL TOUGH TO TAKE FOR MANY PARENTS NOW. THIS IS WHAT MY DAUGHTER EVE TOLD ME HAPPENED AS THEY WERE WARNED OF THIS POTENTIAL THREAT FROM OUR SECRETARY. VOICE CAME OVER THE ANNOUNCEMENTS AND KIND OF TOLD US, GO INTO LOCKDOWN. AND YOU COULD TELL BY HER VOICE THAT IT WAS REAL. SO WE WENT AND MY TEACHER TOOK CONTROL OF THE SITUATION AND WE WENT AND WE HAD AGAINST THE IN BETWEEN OUR TABLES. AND ALL WE’RE HEARING OVER THE ANNOUNCEMENT IS DON’T MOVE. NOW, THIS VIDEO WAS TAKEN BY ANOTHER STUDENT INSIDE OAKLAND CATHOLIC. YOU CAN SEE THE STUDENTS HOVERED TOGETHER INSIDE. WHAT I’M TOLD IS THE COLLEGE COUNSELING OFFICE WITH A LIGHTS OUT AS POLICE CAME TO THE DOOR TO GET THEM OUT. NOW, MY DAUGHTER EVE, WAS IN HER PHYSICS CLASS JUST DOWN THE HALL. SHE TELLS ME FROM THEIR HIDING SPOTS. HER TEACHER WAS TELLING THEM WHAT THEY COULD USE AS WEAPONS INSIDE THE CLASSROOM IF SOMEONE CAME IN. SHE SAYS THAT THE SAME TIME THEY HEARD THE POLICE COMING. THEN EVE TELLS ME THOSE OFFICERS ENTERED HER CLASSROOM, AND ONCE THE ROOMS WERE CLEARED BY POLICE, THE GIRLS WERE SENT OUTSIDE ACROSS THE STREET AND INTO SAINT PAUL CATHEDRAL, WHERE THEY WAITED TO BE COUNTED AND RELEASED. NOW I SPOKE TO A MOM WHO IS ALSO THE DEPUTY CHIEF OF EMS HERE IN THE CITY OF PITTSBURGH. SHE WAS OUTSIDE WAITING FOR HER DAUGHTER. AND ALTHOUGH SHE KNEW IT WAS A HOAX AND HAS BEEN TO MANY ACTIVE SCENES, SHE LIKE MOST OF US, WAS STILL SHAKEN AS SHE TALKED ABOUT HEARING FROM HER DAUGHTER, WHO WAS INSIDE OAKLAND CATHOLIC WHEN SHE THOUGHT A SHOOTER WAS TOO. I READ MY DAUGHTER’S TEXT MESSAGE THAT LIKE BROKE MY HEART. IT WASN’T FROM HER TELEPHONE. IT WAS FROM HER FRIEND’S TELEPHONE. AND IT SAID, MOM, THIS IS ALL WE I JUST WANTED TO SAY I LOVE YOU. THERE’S AN ACTIVE SHOOTER. I LOVE YOU SO MUCH. IT’S. AS YOU SAW THERE, THE EMOTION WAS VERY REAL HERE. EVEN AFTER LEARNING THAT THIS WAS A HOAX. AS MY DAUGHTER TOLD ME, MANY OF HER CLASSMATES GIRLS HERE AT OAKLAND CATHOLIC HAVE SIBLINGS AT CENTRAL CATHOLIC BROTHERS, OF COURSE. AND THEY WERE TEXTING. THEY WERE WORRIED ABOUT THEM HEARING HOW THIS CALL CAME IN. SO IT DEFINITELY WAS AN EMOTIONAL SCENE HERE.
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Parents, students reeling after active school shooter hoax
Video from inside Oakland Catholic High School was captured by a student who hovered in the college counseling office during Wednesday's lockdown. In it, police are going room to room to assure the students they are safe."My physics teacher and the chemistry teacher, who had come across the classroom — we barricaded our door. We shoved our science chairs under it and used a little physics and made it so it wouldn't open," said Eve Majewski, an Oakland Catholic student and daughter of WTAE reporter Marcie Cipriani.Just down the hallway, Majewski was blocking her classroom door and was hiding while she says her teacher made a plan in case a shooter made their way inside."If somebody came in, he was telling us things that we could use if we had to defend ourselves: metal rods that were in the closet, chemicals that were all in the classroom," Majewski said. "And he was promising us, he said, 'I will keep you safe. I will do everything that I can to keep you safe.'"Majewski told Pittsburgh's Action News 4 that at Oakland Catholic, her classroom was one of the first cleared by police. The girls were walked to St. Paul Cathedral while parents received texts and calls from their kids and raced to Oakland."After the event on Monday in Tennessee, it was just, I didn't know what to think, you know," said parent Jim Scott. "I need to get down here and make sure everything's all right. But it's scary."Majewski says by the time they got to the cathedral, she and her classmates knew this was a hoax, but the emotions were still strong."I had friends running up to me," she said. "They were hugging me, sobbing. People were sobbing."
PITTSBURGH —
Video from inside Oakland Catholic High School was captured by a student who hovered in the college counseling office during Wednesday's lockdown. In it, police are going room to room to assure the students they are safe.
"My physics teacher and the chemistry teacher, who had come across the classroom — we barricaded our door. We shoved our science chairs under it and used a little physics and made it so it wouldn't open," said Eve Majewski, an Oakland Catholic student and daughter of WTAE reporter Marcie Cipriani.
Just down the hallway, Majewski was blocking her classroom door and was hiding while she says her teacher made a plan in case a shooter made their way inside.
"If somebody came in, he was telling us things that we could use if we had to defend ourselves: metal rods that were in the closet, chemicals that were all in the classroom," Majewski said. "And he was promising us, he said, 'I will keep you safe. I will do everything that I can to keep you safe.'"
Majewski told Pittsburgh's Action News 4 that at Oakland Catholic, her classroom was one of the first cleared by police. The girls were walked to St. Paul Cathedral while parents received texts and calls from their kids and raced to Oakland.
"After the event on Monday in Tennessee, it was just, I didn't know what to think, you know," said parent Jim Scott. "I need to get down here and make sure everything's all right. But it's scary."
Majewski says by the time they got to the cathedral, she and her classmates knew this was a hoax, but the emotions were still strong.
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"I had friends running up to me," she said. "They were hugging me, sobbing. People were sobbing."
