During the lockdown there was a lot of waiting…..and sitting…..and more waiting. When Mr. Jones said that there was someone spotted in the Central parking lot, people started to freak out. And I got bored…..really bored. So I though I should get out my iPod and start rocking out. So me Sal and Luke where watching South Park on my iPod. IT WAS AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Then Mr. Jones said we would be evacuating the school room by room. About three hours later they came to get us. I didn’t really think that there was guy with a gun in the building but then I found out that this was serious. When I saw the SWAT member standing outside of our door I had mixed thoughts. SWAT and police were everywhere! Shotguns, AMG’s, and a sniper rifle! It was cool….. but kind of scary.

Then when we found out it was some kid that lied about it….. it made me so mad. But its scarier now then it was when it was happening. Now it seems surreal.

- Caleb

April 17, 2007 I went to school feeling not good and that something bad was going to happed. During 2ed block, my English class, Mr. Jones told us that it was a lockdown because someone had seen a man with a handgun in the school. How I felt about the lockdown was scared for my life and I was mad at the end. I thought that we were all going to die. I never thought that something like this can happen to my school in a small town. I was scared that the gun man would come throw the door and shoot all of us and we would be all killed.

During the lockdown it was a mess; I got really mad at some people that I didn’t like but I had to hold back. I was trying to make myself think about everyone that I loved in my life, even my boyfriend, and I thought of a happy place. I was texting my mom telling her what had happed and that I was ok, I was also texting my brother Anthony that is in 12^th grade where we would be meeting after if we were going to get out of here. I really felt like we were going to be getting shot after we leave the room but then again I thought that it might be all a joke on the school – I was not sure though.

An hour has passed and I was getting really scared for every one around me but at the same time I was not scared – I was half and half. I was really getting mad at one of the girls in my English class that was saying things that were not right and not true. I really wanted to slap her but I thought if I did that then I would be into trouble. I started talking to a guy in my class. We just sat and talked through the whole time pretty much. I was getting really hungry so I went through my purse and found some candy and started eating it.

After another hour had passed I had to go to the bathroom so I had to wait until we get out of there. I wanted to get out of that room so I can see my friends and my love ones. So after sitting in there for 3 hours it was getting boring. We heard sounds coming from the outside of the room and the first thought that went throw my mind was “can that be the gun man?” but it was a cop telling us that they are there way to get us out. Another hour had passed and it was really boring in there so I started texting my boyfriend to see if he was ok and all right because I heard that all the schools are in a lockdown right after us. Before I knew it some person was telling us to open the door for the cops so we did and they told us that we had to put our hands on the person’s shoulders in front of us.

When they were getting the other kids out of their rooms we had to stand there with our hands still on the person’s shoulders in front of us. So when they got the other rooms, we left to go down stairs and go outside and cross the street to the civic center. So we all went in there and sat there for a few minutes before Mr. Jones got on the microphone and told us what had happed and he also told us that it was all a hoax. I thought right then and there that this guy is going to be getting into a lot of trouble with the cops and the school; also I thought that it was stupid for him telling them that some one was here with a handgun and started crying. I hope that kid gets into a lot of trouble for putting our lives in danger. I am glad that it was not real because then someone would have been shot and killed. I am happy that we got out safe and that we were never in real harm. But some day it will happed to a school in Rapid like it did at Virginia Tech but I hope not though. I was really ticked off after what had just happed but then again I was glad that it was fake and not real.

- Tonia

I was walking down the hall, next thing I know people are yelling to get in a class room immediately, lucky for me I was already by my class so I got in there right away. When I got in there no one really knew what was going on so we just assumed it was a drill.

Mr. Murphy I think was the one who came on the speakers, he had a panicked tone in his voice, and I started to worry about what was going on since he’s telling us we are having a lock down due to a kid in our school with a hand gun. After that I wasn’t really all that worried, I felt safe in the room I was in, but I was frustrated with my teacher. I didn’t have a phone, I couldn’t call anyone, I couldn’t text anyone, no one was supposed to be using their phones but everyone was. They were all getting texts about all kinds of different rumors, I don’t really know what all of them were but I know there were many. So as I’m sitting in that room for many hours doing absolutely nothing everyone started to get cranky, especially our teacher, but I was just laying on the floor sleeping while all this was going on. I would wake up whenever Mr. Jones came on the speaker, and he did a very good job with keeping us calm.

At this point we have been sitting there in that room for over 3 and a half hours, and my department was one of the last rooms to be evacuated. But when they finally arrived, a cop, a principal, and a SWAT team member came into our room. The SWAT man had a huge gun, which is what really made me believe this was real, but for some reason I was still not scared at all, I guess part of the reason is because I feel very safe here. We were told to put our hands on the person in front of us to create a chain, we were not to break the chain, and we had to move fast so this was a difficult thing to do believe it or not, especially as we walked down the stairs.

Right when I got out side, the first thing I see is cops and SWAT everywhere, police cars all around the area; I look to my left and I see SWAT on the Howard Johnson hotel. We get to the Civic Center, with people everywhere inside, everyone seemed pretty calm except for a few. Then as we are all seated Pat Jones gets on a microphone and starts talking to us, telling us how well we all handled it, then he tells us, THIS WAS A FALSE REPORT! Everyone started to get angry, he wouldn’t tell us who did it but everyone already knew who did it. Then he told us we will be out of school for the rest of the day, we all cheered, but still had anger over the false report.

This was a good experience for all of us, none of us will ever forget this most likely, we all thought it was real and we were all scared in some sort of way, but that just makes it more memorable. Now we all know this can happen to anyone of us, any time. But I know I will not forget it ever. We will all be ready for an event like this, if it ever happens again. We are all hoping it will not happen again but can at any moment. But I know we are all angry about it being false, but we are all blessed to be alive, and still all together.

- Marcus

Tuesday morning at around 9:35, Central High School ordered a school wide lockdown. And it was during red day second block and my class was Nutrition and Wellness and my teacher shortly after the announcement decided to shut and lock the door. When the teachers read their mail boxes and found out that the lockdown was real, we did exactly what the Crisis Response Plan said. It said that we needed to sit on the floor in a safe place away from windows and doors, and to turn off the lights and to be very very quiet. And let me tell you…the kitchen floors suck at being comfortable.

That is exactly what we did. But then everyone had cell phones and they whipped them out and the lights were so bright that it was starting to look like it was the northern lights in our classroom. Everyone was texting their family and friends and telling them that they were ok. The parents were told to wait in the Albertsons parking lot where the Albertsons people handed out free food and drinks for the scared and worried parents. The SWAT team started the evacuations at around 11 in the morning. So our class was one of the first to go out across the street to the Rushmore Plaza Civic Center to safety. The police arrived only TWO minutes after the report had been made. That made me feel somewhat safer for me knowing that they got here that quick. So while we were walking out of the classroom and we had to have both hands onto the person in front of us shoulders.

We had to walk in a single file line and no talking. It was really scary during the whole thing. When Mr. Jones had said that the whole thing was a hoax and that the 15 year old kid that made the call, admitted that it was a fake, I personally think that the kid should be convicted to the full extent. I don’t think that someone should joke around about this kind of stuff. Plus, that fake call cost the state much money and that parents much grief. Especially with the Columbine incident and the Virginia Tech shooting that happened the day before.

When the teachers, staff, and police let us out of the arena, the first person I saw was my mom. When she saw me she ran right over and hugged me like a teddy bear. It was a really terrifying day for all of us to go through that experience.

- Alex (a.k.a ARREX!)

There was me and a couple friends who had second hour off so we were sitting just hanging out when one of my friends said we had a lockdown; we all thought it was a drill because of the Virginia Tech incident but then we heard Norma the security guard say it wasn’t a drill. So we figured that they were bringing in the drug dogs but then all the security guards and a couple administrators were practically yelling “This is not a drill!” So we were basically pushed up the stairs into the library and we were told to sit down, stay down, and stay quiet.

About a minute after Mr. Jones said what was happening my phone started going off like crazy; I got texts from all my friends, calls from my family and friends, everything! But we weren’t supposed to use our phones, 10 people got theirs taken away. We had to stay quiet so my friends and I started painting each other’s nails…even the guys! And then we tried to read seeing how we were in the library but we were in the non-fiction section so there wasn’t much that we wanted to read.

We weren’t told much in the library or I at least couldn’t really hear it…some people were a little worried and others weren’t taking it very seriously…some made me really mad because if there had been a gun in the school we could’ve been in a lot of danger; a lot of people just would not shut their mouths.

There were a lot of rumors going around. When Mr. Jones first came over the intercom someone said that he sounded like he had a gun to his head, most of the rumors obviously were just people’s imaginations gone wild in a state of terror.

So most of the time was just sitting and waiting, sitting and waiting, and then they told us we were going to evacuate but we still had to sit and wait because they said we were the biggest group so they were going to take us last. Then a couple SWAT Team members and police officers came up to the library and then we just stood and waited. We finally started to leave the library and that’s when it hit most of us that we were in danger. Some still didn’t get it but for a lot of us when we saw the police and the SWAT Team we were worried; maybe not for ourselves but for someone, a little brother or sister, a friend, or a boyfriend or girlfriend.

We walked over to the Civic Center with one hand on the shoulder of the person in front of us. Then my friend called me and I was talking to her because she wasn’t there but she wanted to know if everyone was alright and what was going on. She had heard that whoever supposedly had a gun went into Central and when he was spotted he ran out and went to Stevens but he couldn’t get onto campus because there were already police officers there so he went to Western Dakota Tech and was supposedly arrested there. A few minutes afterwards we were told that the whole thing wasn’t even real. The entire auditorium went into an uproar. I heard almost everyone around me say “You’ve got to be kidding!” I want to know how someone could do that. Even if I could start something like that I would not be able to keep it going for almost four hours.

- Christine

I was very mad about what happened yesterday. I wasn’t scared, but I knew something bad was happening. When Pat Jones made the announcement for the teachers to check email, I knew there was a problem. I figured that there were 2,400 kids in our school and the chances of me getting hurt were not very likely.

My mom works at Grandview Elementary, and she said she was pretty scared. She was a lot more worried than me from what I could tell. She felt weird because there were actual people with real guns standing around her. She said she had never seen anything like that. The whole reason they came to Grandview was that someone reported gunshots. My mom said that this never happened.

After I heard that this thing was all fake I was really mad. I realized that I just wasted my whole school day for a joke some kid played. I was very mad. And after Mr. Jones said that we might have to make the day up, I was really ticked off. That was one of the worst days I have had. I sat in the corner of my Social Studies class all day, and we might have to make the day up? I would be really upset about that. But the important thing is that nobody got hurt. So that was about the only good part of the day.

-Nick