The FBI is now involved in investigating threats made against dozens of schools in Delaware and surrounding states this week and last.
The latest came in Tuesday morning to five more First State schools, prompting evacuations.
Most schools have gotten calls about a bomb in the building, but this time two First State schools were among those who got calls about an armed person on the roof.
Indian River's Long Neck Elementary School and Dover's Central Middle School received those calls from a computer-distorted male voice around mid-morning. The person stated that he or other suspects were armed on the roof of the schools, intending to harm students and faculty.
State Police spokesman Gary Fournier says students went into lockdown, moved to a cleared area in the school and then were evacuated. Dover Police handled Central Middle School, while state troopers oversaw Long Neck Elementary in the Indian River School District.
"Our aviation unit did an aerial surveillance of the area," Fournier says. "[They] did not find anything out of the ordinary, did not see any suspicious person or anyone on the roof or on the grounds that was out of the ordinary."
He says searches inside the buildings turned up empty, too.
Meanwhile, Silver Lake Elementary in Middletown, Rehoboth Beach Elementary and Woodbridge High in Bridgeville received computer-distorted calls about a bomb in the building. Searches at those schools also found nothing.
"We do not look at these as hoaxes -- we take them very seriously," Fournier says. "Obviously we need to, because of the safety and the wellbeing of the students and faculty that go to these schools."
Tuesday's incidents make 19 calls in total in Delaware since last week, including two to Central Middle, all from similarly distorted voices.
Fournier says state and local police are passing information onto the FBI and working with agencies in Delaware and out-of-state, as well as the school districts involved, as the investigation continues.
