EAST LANSING, Mich. — Michigan State University police accidentally sent an emergency alert about an "active violence incident" to students, parents and alumni Tuesday morning, causing fear in the campus community just days before the three-year anniversary of the deadly 2021 shooting.
WATCH BELOW: MSU sends false emergency alert
The false alarm occurred at 10:51 a.m. during what was supposed to be routine monthly training for the university's security operations center, according to MSU Police Chief Mike Yankowski.
"Our security operations center on a monthly basis is required to go through emergency notification form and exercise and they were trying to enhance that today," Yankowski said.
The text message read "DRILL, EMERGENCY, ACTIVE VIOLENCE INCIDENT" and was distributed through the university's emergency alert system to the entire MSU community.
"Unfortunately at about 10:51am, a message was sent out through our emergency alert notification system," Yankowski said.
Officials realized the error quickly and sent a correction message two minutes later telling recipients to disregard the alert.
"They quickly realized it went out live," Yankowski said.
The timing proved particularly alarming for the campus community, coming just days before the February 13 anniversary of the mass shooting that killed three MSU students in 2023.
Student Sam Wiest said the alert left him confused and concerned about what action to take.
"I was just thinking like this has happened before so maybe something was wrong," Wiest said.
Chief Yankowski took full responsibility for the error and issued an apology to the university community.
"On behalf of the Michigan State University department of police and public safety, I take full responsibility for that. I also want to sincerely apologize to the MSU community, for the false information that was shared and the error message sent out," Yankowski said.
The police department is now reviewing procedures to prevent similar incidents from occurring during future training exercises.
This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
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