On Friday, October 12th, Morro Bay High School was subject to an unplanned evacuation after a student accidentally left a plastic container in a science hall oven. On the same day, concerns were raised about a shooting threat to the school, which the Morro Bay High School administration and KSBY dismissed as false.
The fire occurred at lunch, leading to the evacuation of all students onto the East Field. Although nobody was harmed, science classes will take place in different locations until their original rooms are properly cleaned of any residual materials.
In an unrelated incident, early in the day, worry arose after a phone call was sent out to parents explaining the situation, saying that there had been a scare but that students were not in any danger in response to an anonymous report.
When asked, Jorden Taylor, the student who administered the anonymous report shared his experience: “I reported [a student] to the office and recently I found out that he’s actually innocent, so I feel like kind of a [jerk], you know?” (in order to maintain anonymity, the name of the student in question has been omitted. )
Taylor continued, explaining that he made the report because he received information from a friend who said that “they were afraid to go to the Pep Rally… [because] this kid…was going to shoot up the Pep Rally.” Upon hearing this and realizing that nobody else had said something to authorities, Jorden “reported him to school security.”
As Jorden stated, however, the student who was reported was ultimately proven innocent, with local news source KSBY saying that police “say rumors of an arrest and a gun found at the school Friday morning are not true.” Ultimately, the situation is best described by Sophomore Parker Barandon, who said that it was a “rumor gone wild.”
