Active shooter at Mason Hall per UM alert.
Can confirm. People running everywhere.
Major reason why you want to fix this minor-league website a little--not great to be helping spread hysteria because people still can't get back into their own posts months on. . .
Jesus. Stay safe peeps.
Conclusion: Seems like a false report based on a group of students popping balloons in Mason Hall. A game of telephone then ensued with reports of a shooter in the UgLi, a shooter on State Street, etc. based on phone calls from people saying they "heard" this information. Great work and response by the Ann Arbor and University police and the Michigan social media accounts for getting out the word quickly. Thankfully in this case it seems like a false alarm, however they are still clearing rooms in the buildings. Listened to the scanner and the important points I heard are below.
Local news mentioning it was a group of 14 girls popping balloons and screaming: https://twitter.com/SteveGaragiola/status/1107030834647834627
Steve stated an all-clear. Police are not sending more units per the scanner.
1. I'm listening to the police scanner. Looks like they are searching through the building and escorting people outside. Doesn't sound like there is active shooting going on currently. They said a State Representative was in the building and they are trying to locate and evacuate them. Hopefully it is a false alarm.
2. Suspect described wearing black shirt black jeans arrived in a silver Camry does not appear to have weapons. (Description was "heard" not confirmed)
3. Shit, they received a call saying that the active shooter is headed towards the Brown Jug. The caller "heard" the information but not confirmed. They are sending a unit there.
4. "Popping balloons" was mentioned on the scanner. I am hoping that was it.
5. Multiple calls mentioning active shooter is in the UgLi (Undergraduate Library).
6. Male wearing purple hoodie and ripped jeans going to people's porches with yellow bag, reportedly acting suspicious (probably unrelated).
7. Fire alarm going off in the Hatcher Graduate library.
8. Balloons were confirmed being popped in room 1339 in Mason Hall. (Sounds very much like a false alarm and a game of telephone ensues.)
9. Caller: Male with a gun in a trenchcoat walking down State Street. (Hopefully another rumor).
https://www.broadcastify.com/listen/feed/3913
Is this your conclusion or the polices?
Mine but based on what the police are saying. Feel free to listen to the broadcast. They are pulling units out. Also local news is confirming the report about balloons.
No sorry wasn’t trying to challenge just worried. Thank you for the updates
All good, I totally understand what you mean! I am just happy with the response too by everyone involved. It sounds like they had a quick response and good communication from the University.
Pretty easy to discern gunshots from things like fireworks and popping balloons to a trained ear. Glad everyone is ok and that no bystanders were hurt since a hysterical reaction presents its own dangers.
Whoo boy are you right. That’s the scary part of reporting what you “hear”. Also some vigilantes or white knights could’ve come out and cause some confusion.
Eh, I think this gets a bit overstated. Some (not all) of my friends who are vets (Vietnam and Iraq) aren’t real big fans of the sound of fireworks, but they’ve certainly heard enough gunfire to have “trained” ears. It’s certainly not easy when you have lots of background noise.
Yeah just the initial concussive sound of anything that explodes can do it for those that have PTSD. But I guarantee every one of the guys you know with that background can tell the difference between an m16 and ak47 when they hear it.
This reminded me of a story. I'm from a small, quiet town in Michigan. Mom didn't allow us to have guns or hunt or anything. I've heard gunshots before, but I'm not a trained ear. I work as a carpenter in Portland, OR now. I was working with an old Mexican dude on a random house 1 day. And I thought I heard gunshots really close, but he didn't react so I figured I shouldn't be a wuss and kept working. A couple minutes later, cop cars are flying by. I was like "oh shit, those were gunshots" and he's like "no shit, it was 4 shots from 2 guns, sounded about a block away." Dude just kept working like nothing was up and I was too dumb to know anything was up. Turns out Mexico City is a little rougher than Chelsea, MI
Kinda weird I get an incomprehensible Amber Alert last week which contains little more than a license plate number, but I get nothing for an active shooter.
As a student, I got a school notification 20 minutes after I heard via group chats, which is absolutely absurd
stay safe everyone
What? Is this real?
There might be 3 shooters. Apparently they're heading towards the UgLi. Suspect(s) have not been apprehended yet.
This sounds like a rumor...
It's straight off of the official live phone call we're tuning in on so I don't think it's a rumor. I hope it's not true but these are official reports.
Sounds like a number of phone calls to police without confirmation so far, but these things are always sketchy early.
So confused. Might just be balloons being popped...?
DO NOT TEXT OR CALL your loved ones until suspects are confirmed dead or in custody (or it’s confirmed a hoax). In the event they are hiding you might give away their location if their phone isn’t silenced. It sucks but if they need help and can communicate at all let them call/text out.
I'm following the Daily and UM Public Affairs
https://twitter.com/michigandaily
https://twitter.com/UMPublicAffairs
So far unconfirmed reports, police searching the third floor of Mason Hall. Students in the UGLi have barricaded themselves in one of the computer labs.
Got that text too. Isn’t Mason hall, offices, who would be there on a Saturday?
Dang hope they get the shooter and no fatalities
Daily reporters now saying they have heard multiple wounded. NOT confirmed by authorities yet.
That is a really reckless tweet by the Daily. There's 0 confirmation.
They have now deleted it. Apologies for posting.
Not you’re fault, I would have never thought they would tweet something like that without confirmation. That’s journalistic malpractice.
Hopefully a learning moment for whoever is running that Twitter account today.
Not a good moment for the Daily. Seriously, hope this is a lesson well learned.
DPSS now saying there does not appear to be an active threat to the community.
Bunch of idiots spreading bullshit
No one's trying to spread bullshit. There may or may not be a situation so better safe than sorry.
Also in reference to the post below. You're quick to bring politics into this huh.
Lol! This sounds like a typical Ann Arbor amateur hour.
You've worn out your welcome troll.
Hey idiot, aren't you late for work? Pizzas ain't going to deliver themselves.
If this were MSU, it would be much easier to confirm whether the couches were burning or not by looking skyward.
You just said Michigan is a fraud and MSU will continue to expose us as one tomorrow
So is this confirmed to not be true?
What we have confirmed is that DPSS and UM Public Affairs are saying that there does not appear to be a threat to the community at this time, and I've seen no reports of confirmed shots fired or injuries.
There's a small chance that there was a threat and it has been neutralized while being consistent with available information, but it appears this was a false alarm, happily.
I would say most likely not true. Definitely not confirmed though.
Before this turns into a thread dumping on UofM students, I'd just like to share a story. I'm a grad student and earlier this week I was in class when there was an incredibly loud bang right outside our classroom. My first gut instinct was that there was a shooter in the hallway, and I've never before had such a feeling of fear. It turned out to be a maintenance guy in the next classroom over accidentally knocking over a door.
I grew up around guns and know how to operate them, and what they sound like. But young people today have grown up in a world where this sort of thing happening at a school or college campus is a weekly occurrence and it's a reasonable fear for us. God forbid we might be a little hypersensitive to this threat.
The problem isn't people being afraid about this sort of thing..it's the desire to spread the 'news' on social media with people adding their own assumptions and speculative theories to spice up what they actually know which tends to be very little.
What if there was actually an event? Social media is how word gets out quickly and can keep people safe. Just because this one turned out to be nothing doesn't mean social media didn't play an important role in people on the ground, on campus, in doing the things they needed to do to make themselves safe in a scary situation.
Huh? Spreading untruthful information is just as bad in the event of a real threat as it keeps responders and people in the vicinity from getting an accurate picture of the situation.
People need to stick to reporting what they actually know. The first reply in this thread confirmed an active shooter that never happened. Obviously based on 2nd hand information and jumping to conclusions. Doing that is irresponsible whether its a media outlet or a person on a forum or Twitter. And its usually not a humanitarian desire to warn people that drives that sort of gossip mongering..its the desire to have a scoop, to get attention by seemingly having information thats highly valuable.
That shit is why theres still truthers who use the false statements from people shortly after the attacks as “proof“ for a conspiracy when in reality that was just people eager to share information they didn’t actually have.
Ok now. This does NOT happen on a weekly basis. These are decidedly rare, extremely rare, events.
With that said, I agree that you can remain vigilant regardless.
This site documents shootings with 4 or more victims (injured or killed, not including the perpetrator) in the US.
There have been 57 so far in 2019, in 75 days. Their 2018 total was 340; 2017 346; 2016 382.