Maria Canton
Northern News Services

Iqaluit (Oct 09/00) - A fake bomb threat by a 15-year-old girl forced the evacuation of six schools in Iqaluit and Apex Oct. 3.

The threat was made from a pay phone at the Frobisher Inn to the RCMP dispatch centre and the caller warned that the bomb would go off at 1:45 p.m.

"The caller didn't say which school the bomb was at so we had to evacuate all of the schools, including Arctic College," said Staff Sgt. Jim MacDougall.

Only Inuksuk High School, Aqsarniit School and Nanook School in Apex had classes that day. Nakasuk School and Joamie School only had teachers in the buildings.

Nakasuk also had children at the day care.

The police visited all of the schools and waited more than an hour after the bomb was supposed to go off before concluding the threat was a hoax.

"All of the schools closed up for the day after that and we waited outside to see if anything would happen," said MacDougall.

RCMP traced the call to a pay phone and MacDougall said an investigation led to a young offender. No charges have been laid.