Over 500 students from residence halls at the University of Central Florida in Orlando were evacuated in the wee hours of Monday after the authorities found a student dead from what appeared to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound inside a dorm and discovered guns and improvised explosive devices.
The authorities said there was no imminent threat but the university shut down the main campus and cancelled classes till noon to facilitate the ongoing investigations.
A fire alarm went up around 12.20 am in Tower 1, which has a residence hall for about 500 students. As the university police were on their way, officers received a call about a man with a gun in the residence hall.
By the time police arrived, the man was found dead and interviews with several witnesses confirmed that he was a student. He was not immediately identified. Also, there was no word yet on whether he had left any note in his room.
University spokesman Grant Heston was quoted by the Orlando Sentinel newspaper as saying that the man’s body, the weapons and the explosive devices were all found in one of the rooms in his dorm apartment.
A handgun, an assault weapon and a bag containing improvised explosive
devices were found in the student’s room.
“We don’t believe there is any imminent threat to the campus,” Heston said. FBI and other law enforcement officials were trying to ensure that the explosive devices were safely removed from the building and from the campus. Police said the safety of students in Tower 1 and the whole campus community was their top priority.
The university campus “has had multiple recent reports of suspicious packages that turned out to be false alarms”, the Sentinel reported quoting students, who for that reason did not initially take the midnight episode seriously.
The University of Central Florida has more than 59,000 students at its main campus and 10 regional campuses.