Lockdown False Alarm At Plainfield Central High; Sensor Blamed

PLAINFIELD, IL — A lockdown alarm went off at Plainfield Central High School at approximately 6:50 a.m. on Wednesday, Dec. 4. Lockdown alarms are meant to alert students and staff to a potentially threatening situation in the school or surrounding area, but it was quickly determined that in this instance, it was a false alarm. Students who were evacuated from their classes were quickly returned, parents were notified, and the school day went on as normal, District 202 Director of Community Relations Tom Hernandez said.

"It was a false alarm; as we always do with these things the building was evacuated, it took a few minutes to realize what had gone on. The kids were back in school, everything was back in school in a few minutes," he said.

The Plainfield Police Department released the news that the alarm was a false one on their Facebook page shortly after 7:30 a.m.

"In this case it was a false alarm, and we're looking into what the cause of it was now," Plainfield PD Sergeant Colin Mulacek said.

Hernandez said the false alarm was caused by a sensor malfunction in the alarm itself. This is the second time in 30 days that a false alarm has been triggered in a Plainfield School District 202 building.

"We have 33 buildings, 31 schools, so there's a lot of alarms and there's a lot of systems, and we're constantly working with the vendors... sometime things happen and we take care of it," Hernandez said.

The alarm in question was built by Alarm Detection Systems, a security supplier based out of Aurora. Hernandez told Patch via email that ADS technicians came to inspect Central High's alarm system immediately after the incident. Officials at the company did not return calls for comment by time of publication.