'Serious Threat' Closes NMU Campus

It's a crazy world we live in these days - as exhibited by the September 11 attacks on our country, attacks on our public transportation systems, and school shootings. A few months ago, there was a school hostage situation that hit close to home to many of us in the Upper Peninsula at Marinette High School. The hostage taker was killed from a self-inflicted gun shot wound, while the hostages themselves were uninjured. Thankfully that situation wasn't any worse than it could have been, but it was still bad enough. And having a situation like that happening so close to home really shakes a person up. And now we're dealing with a serious situation in the city of Marquette today...

The campus of Northern Michigan University has been shut down due to a serious threat it had received via a blog. According to NMU officials, they are unsure as to which part of the campus was being targeted so as a precaution, they have shut down the entire campus. The message posted on the blog apparently said that they would break the record of those killed during the shootings on the Virginia Tech campus during a rampage at NMU. One of the local news stations in the Marquette area, WLUC TV6, has not been able to locate the blog in question and so it is not known exactly what the blog says. It is very evident that officials at NMU have seen the blog posting, however. But NMU officials are taking the situation very seriously by closing the campus and restricting all activities until everything can be investigated.

In addition, because the NMU campus is close to several of the Marquette Area Public School buildings, Marquette schools will be dismissing early (most of the buildings have already released students as of this time). Marquette General Hospital is also very close to the NMU campus so they have greatly increased security in and around the facility but are not totally closed. Access can be made at five different points within the MGH building complex. If you have appointments, Marquette General is still open, but you may need to search around for an access point.

For continuing updates on the threat posed to the campus of NMU, please follow a few of the sites I have linked. I will not be able to update throughout the day, so these other sites will be your best bet. As of now, this has just been a safety precaution taken by officials at NMU to prevent a potentially serious situation to its students and staff. In this day and age, you can never be too safe. And yes, it just goes to show you that a situation like this can happen here in the Upper Peninsula. Thankfully, the authorities were alerted of the situation before something actually could happen. Preventive measures need to be taken to avert a potentially terrible situation here in Marquette.

UPDATE (12 PM): As per some rumors floating around out there - there has not been a hostage situation on NMU's campus and no arrests have taken place as of yet. The situation is under control. NMU officials remind people to stay away from the campus today and a determination on whether classes will be held tomorrow will be made later in the day. Marquette General is still open, just access to the various MGH building is restricted to five entryways. The Marquette YMCA facility is also closed, due to its close proximity to NMU's Berry Events Center. This closure also includes Marquette's Lakeview Arena. Traffic in and around NMU's campus and various Marquette Public School facilities has been hectic so please avoid those areas, if you can.

-WLUC TV-6 Facebook Page - Their website is currently down due to traffic demand. Their website is uppermichiganssource.com

-The Marquette Mining Journal