{
  "id": "2015-09-23-purdue-university-schleman-hall-bomb-threat",
  "slug": "purdue-university-schleman-hall-bomb-threat-2015-09-23",
  "institution": {
    "name": "Purdue University",
    "shortName": "Purdue",
    "state": "IN",
    "type": "public-r1",
    "alertSystemName": "PurdueALERT",
    "enrollment": 41000
  },
  "incident": {
    "date": "2015-09-23",
    "type": "bomb-threat",
    "cleryCategory": "emergency-notification",
    "headline": "A bomb threat empties a student-services building for two hours before an all-clear",
    "headlinePublic": "A bomb threat empties a student-services building for two hours before an all-clear",
    "summary": "On the morning of September 23, 2015, [Purdue University Police](https://fox59.com/2015/09/23/purdue-university-investigate-bomb-threat/) responded to a bomb threat at Schleman Hall of Student Services, an academic-services building on Purdue's West Lafayette campus. Police and fire crews arrived around 11:45 AM CDT, evacuated the building, and conducted a two-hour sweep. PurdueALERT messages directed students and staff to avoid the building and follow shelter instructions. After roughly two hours, no explosive device was located and the building was reopened.",
    "outcome": "Schleman Hall evacuated for approximately two hours. No device found, no injuries. Building reopened in the afternoon. Investigation referred to Purdue PD and federal partners; no public arrest was announced.",
    "resolution": "false-alarm"
  },
  "alerts": [
    {
      "sequence": 1,
      "type": "initial",
      "channel": "twitter-x",
      "verbatimText": "Bomb threat reported at Purdue WL - Schleman Hall - 475 Stadium Mall Drive); avoid the area; check http://purdue.edu/ea for updates",
      "isVerbatimConfirmed": true,
      "annotations": [
        "Verbatim from official @PurdueALERT X post. Pre-280-char era; text is the complete status as transmitted (seq2 ends mid-phrase at the 140-char boundary).",
        "Corrected to exact fxtwitter display text."
      ],
      "characterCount": 131,
      "sourceUrl": "https://x.com/PurdueALERT/status/646707669944901632",
      "timestamp": "2015-09-23T11:28:18-04:00",
      "sourceDescription": "@PurdueALERT on X (verbatim)"
    },
    {
      "sequence": 2,
      "type": "update",
      "channel": "twitter-x",
      "verbatimText": "Purdue WL advising to continue avoiding the area of Schleman Hall-475 Stadium Mall Dr, due to Bomb threat; check http://purdue.edu/ea for",
      "isVerbatimConfirmed": true,
      "annotations": [
        "Verbatim from official @PurdueALERT X post. Pre-280-char era; text is the complete status as transmitted (seq2 ends mid-phrase at the 140-char boundary).",
        "Corrected to exact fxtwitter display text."
      ],
      "characterCount": 137,
      "sourceUrl": "https://x.com/PurdueALERT/status/646726592144764928",
      "timestamp": "2015-09-23T12:43:29-04:00",
      "sourceDescription": "@PurdueALERT on X (verbatim)"
    },
    {
      "sequence": 3,
      "type": "all-clear",
      "channel": "twitter-x",
      "verbatimText": "Purdue WL advising there is no ongoing threat to campus; Schleman Hall has resumed normal operations.",
      "isVerbatimConfirmed": true,
      "sourceUrl": "https://x.com/PurdueALERT/status/646733935498686464",
      "annotations": [
        "Verbatim from official @PurdueALERT X post. Pre-280-char era; text is the complete status as transmitted (seq2 ends mid-phrase at the 140-char boundary).",
        "Channel corrected from reconstructed SMS to twitter-x per official X transmission."
      ],
      "characterCount": 101,
      "timestamp": "2015-09-23T13:12:40-04:00",
      "sourceDescription": "@PurdueALERT on X (verbatim)"
    }
  ],
  "sources": [
    {
      "title": "@PurdueALERT Schleman Hall bomb threat chain (X)",
      "url": "https://x.com/PurdueALERT/status/646707669944901632",
      "type": "official-social"
    },
    {
      "title": "Purdue University police and fire finish investigation regarding bomb threat on campus, nothing found — Fox 59 (September 23, 2015)",
      "url": "https://fox59.com/2015/09/23/purdue-university-investigate-bomb-threat/",
      "type": "local-media"
    },
    {
      "title": "PurdueALERT — Emergency Preparedness and Planning (Purdue University)",
      "url": "https://www.purdue.edu/ehps/emergency-preparedness/purduealert/index.php",
      "type": "official-archive"
    },
    {
      "title": "Emergency Procedures Guide — Emergency Preparedness and Planning (Purdue University)",
      "url": "https://www.purdue.edu/ehps/emergency-preparedness/emergency-plans/emergency-procedures-guide.php",
      "type": "official-archive"
    },
    {
      "title": "@PurdueALERT on X (verbatim)",
      "url": "https://x.com/PurdueALERT/status/646726592144764928",
      "type": "official-archive"
    },
    {
      "title": "@PurdueALERT on X (verbatim)",
      "url": "https://x.com/PurdueALERT/status/646733935498686464",
      "type": "official-archive"
    }
  ],
  "context": "On September 23, 2015, [Purdue University Police and Fire responded to a bomb threat](https://fox59.com/2015/09/23/purdue-university-investigate-bomb-threat/) at Schleman Hall of Student Services on the West Lafayette campus. The building was evacuated around 11:45 AM CDT, with PurdueALERTs sent via SMS, email, and Twitter directing students and staff to avoid the area. Schleman Hall houses Purdue's Office of the Registrar, admissions, and other student-services operations, a high-foot-traffic but academically peripheral building whose evacuation disrupted services without canceling classes elsewhere. Police and fire conducted a two-hour sweep, found no device, and reopened the building in the afternoon. The case is a quiet but representative example of an R1 single-building bomb-threat response: the [PurdueALERT system](https://www.purdue.edu/ehps/emergency-preparedness/purduealert/index.php) sends campus-wide notifications even for localized incidents, the standard three-message arc (initial + update + all-clear) is preserved, and academic operations elsewhere on the 41,000-student campus continue without disruption. The 2015 Schleman Hall incident sits between Purdue's [January 2014 Andrew Boldt shooting](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Purdue_University_shooting) in the Electrical Engineering Building and later bomb threats targeting the campus, illustrating how a single university's alert system handles a spectrum of incident severity over a multi-year window.",
  "keyFindings": [
    "Schleman Hall houses Purdue's Registrar and admissions operations; evacuating it disrupts student services without affecting classes elsewhere",
    "PurdueALERT's three-message arc (initial + update + all-clear) is preserved even for a single-building, two-hour investigation",
    "Other campus buildings explicitly continued operations during the evacuation, an important framing on a 41,000-student R1",
    "Two-hour sweep duration is consistent with a single-building bomb-threat investigation without a found device",
    "No public arrest was announced in the immediate aftermath; investigation referred to Purdue PD and federal partners"
  ],
  "responseTimeMinutes": 5,
  "confidence": "high",
  "tags": [
    "bomb-threat",
    "evacuation",
    "purdue",
    "schleman-hall",
    "purduealert",
    "public-r1",
    "indiana",
    "single-building",
    "false-alarm",
    "september-2015"
  ],
  "dateAdded": "2026-05-14",
  "lastUpdated": "2026-07-18",
  "addedBy": "ingestion"
}