http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/06/11/princeton-bomb-threat/2411359/

http://www.11alive.com/news/article/295660/40/Bomb-threat-forces-evacuations-near-Ga-State-Capitol

http://www.usatoday.com/story/todayinthesky/2013/06/11/richmond-airport-evacuated-after-threatening-call-received/2411107/

http://www.usatoday.com/videos/travel/flights/2013/06/11/2411027/

So here's the short version: about 6:30 this morning, a bomb threat was phoned in against Richmond, VA International Airport, which prompted officials to evacuate not only the entire airport, but the parking complexes as well. A few hours later, a bomb threat was called in against the University of Princeton, apparently against multiple unspecified buildings. The entire campus was evacuated. Later, bomb threats were called into the offices of the Attorney General's Office and the State Supreme Court in Atlanta, Georgia. And yet another bomb threat was phoned in on a Southwest-Airlines flight from LA to Austin, TX, forcing it to land in Phoenix, AZ.

So far, all the locations have either been cleared or else nothing has been found so far, but this whole thing has the hairs on the back of my neck standing up. Four bomb threats against four high-profile targets across the country made within a few hours of each other? And from what I've heard, the Princeton, VA Intl, and Atlanta threats all specified multiple devices in several locations at each site. Call me paranoid, but this whole thing just screams "COORDINATED" to me. Seems like someone, or some group, is testing response times and procedures.

What are your thoughts on this?

There's this too: http://news.yahoo.com/atlanta-airport-evacuated-explosion-maintenance-shed-165103873.html?.tsrc=attcf

  I'm surprised they haven't used this tactic before (any normal troublemaker) at the least it causes a GREAT deal of inconveniance and extra expense.  At the best it eventually wears people down and makes a real threat less important.

 

This could just be some jerk(s) getting his (their) jollies by calling in threats.  However, bureaucracies love their procedures so just observing the police response to a bomb threat reveals patterns in how the they respond and deal with it. Patterns have holes in them. A bomb threat can also be used to draw resources away from the place you really want to hit.

Nah. That's easy. If a bomb goes off, responders will be there for hours so if they set them for anywhere from 10 minutes on they'll get cops, firemen etc. They've already worked that process out years ago in Israel.

One angle to consider is the shark attack factor.

That's when there is an event that happens with a certain degree of regularity...such as 3-5 people being attacked by sharks every summer.  It is normally very lightly reported by the national news media if it is reported as all.  State media covers it a bit and of course local media as well.

Then something happens to make it more newsworthy.  Maybe a famous person gets attacked.  Maybe a movie on the subject gets made.  Whatever the reason, the national media latches on one story and it gets a lot of coverage.

Then when the next shark attack happens even though it actually falls in the norm, it gets a ton of media coverage.  As does the next, and as does the next.  The average viewer never knowing that 3-5 shark attacks per year is average, instead just sees a chain of high coverage events and may well conclude 'boy swimming in the ocean sure is dangerous!' and 'why are all these shark attacks happening all of a sudden'.


Thinking of that filter, how many bomb threats do you think the USA as a whole has happen every year?  Is this actually unusual, or does it just SEEM unusual due to increased coverage in the media?

Is there some reason why there would be increased media coverage of bomb threats?  I think that people being more afraid and seeing potential terrorists around every corner really helps the NSA, PRISM, etc.

Thinking of that filter, how many bomb threats do you think the USA as a whole has happen every year?  Is this actually unusual, or does it just SEEM unusual due to increased coverage in the media?

It seems unusual to me because they all were made within the span of just a few hours. If they'd happened weeks or even days apart, I probably wouldn't think twice about it.