Bomb Threat Causes Clearing Of B-School, MIT Buildings

A bomb threat from a man who claimed affiliation with the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) forced the evacuation of some buildings at the Business School and at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) yesterday.

Saul L. Chafin, chief of University police, said in a news release yesterday," "An unidentified male with a foreign accent telephoned the (Cambridge police) station announcing his affiliation with the PLC."

The caller said he had planted two bombs, one at MIT's Sloane School of Management and a second at Aldrich Hall at the B-School, "because of Carter's visit to Egypt," the news release said. Both bombs were set to go off at 11 a.m., the caller said.

Capt. Jack W. Morse of the University police said yesterday the threat was called into the Cambridge Police Department (CPD) at about 8:30 p.m. The CPD then informed the University police.

University police evacuated Aldrich Hall at about 10 a.m., Morse said. The building remained sealed off until noon, when Harvard officers and Boston bomb squad police decided there was no bomb in the building. MIT campus police evacuated Sloane through the fire drill procedure, James Oliveri, chief of MIT police said, adding they found no bombs.

Almost 1000 B-School students were in the Aldrich building at the time of the threat, Timothy W. Armour, administrative director of the Program for Management Development at the B-School, said yesterday.

Armour said when the evacuation began the entire first year class was in the building taking a final exam. The students were allowed to take the exam home for completion and were given an hour extension, he said.

"The people taking the exam were upset, but we did our best to accommodate the dislocation. We were more concerned about the students' safety," Armour said.