Gardaí investigating series of bomb threats to schools

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Gardaí are investigating a series of bomb threats made to a large number of schools around the country on Wednesday, though they have been assessed as “not credible”. The response…

Gardaí are investigating a series of bomb threats made to a large number of schools around the country on Wednesday, though they have been assessed as “not credible”.

Though the threats come in the same week Dublin hosts up to 50 European and world leaders at two EU presidency summits, it does not appear the threats are specifically aimed disrupting those events.

As was the case last week, Wednesday’s bomb hoax was sent to a very wide range of entities across Ireland, Britain, and other European countries.

As well as hundreds of schools being targeted across the Republic and the North, a large number of media outlets also received a threat including RTÉ, The Journal, Reuters, The Guardian, BBC, Sky News and others.

In a message to staff, RTÉ director general Kevin Bakhurst informed them “another security threat” had been received via email at 9.22am and was immediately referred to the Garda.

“It was short, very unspecific and it was largely sent to a range of UK media organisations as well as a couple in Ireland, including RTÉ,” he said.

“The advice from the gardaí was very clear - which was not to take any further action. It is apparent that there were also a range of other non-media organisations who received similar emails.”

Last week, when RTÉ received a generic threat, it evacuated its Donnybrook campus in south Dublin and programming was interrupted, with some radio shows going off air.

There was annoyance in Garda Headquarters at that approach. Some officers believed the decision, by a national broadcaster, to effectively abandon live broadcasts, had created undue panic across the country over a threat that was clearly not specific to RTÉ.

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