A Utah State University employee was trying to teach students how to trace an animal tracking collar Tuesday — leaving it outside the iconic Old Main building on campus for them to locate.
But an unintended audience found it first.
Another staffer apparently watched the employee place the collar by the building and felt that behavior was concerning — not knowing it was for a class, and hours before Turning Point USA was scheduled to be on campus for its first Utah event since founder Charlie Kirk was fatally shot in the state weeks ago.
The worried staffer called police “about a suspicious item placed in a suspicious manner,” USU said in an updated statement about the situation.
The school immediately alerted those on the Logan campus to evacuate the area.
Responding authorities then detonated the suspicious item “out of an abundance of caution,” university spokesperson Amanda DeRito confirmed, just before 4 p.m. Tuesday.
It wasn’t until after the item was destroyed that officers learned it wasn’t all that suspicious — and actually pretty common — at least for an agriculture- and animal-focused school like USU. Many students, faculty and researchers there regularly use wildlife telemetry collars in field work to track animals.
The class was practicing how to conduct telemetry — which involves using sensors to collect and transmit data, as well as to locate moving animals with GPS coordinates. At USU, projects include tracking mule deer near the San Rafael Swell and bison in the Henry Mountains.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the school also used animal collars to track the virus in deer populations across the state.
The collars typically feature a large black box and an antenna.
The statement Wednesday from USU said a bomb squad “typically detonates objects with GPS signals, cell antennas, and other such items that they come across to render them safe out of an abundance of caution.”
Campus was already on high alert Tuesday, with an increased police presence ahead of Turning Point USA’s high profile event.
[Read more: From Kirk tributes to anger at Cox, here are the messages people were wearing as Turning Point returned to Utah]
The device was located just hours before and about half a mile away from where that was happening. The bomb squad that responded to the suspicious item Tuesday was already on campus for that gathering, DeRito said.
(Jeff Parrott) Law enforcement officers stand outside a trailer on the campus of Utah State University in Logan, after a small item was detonated "out of an abundance of caution," a university spokesperson said. The Old Main building was evacuated before the package was detonated outside its north side.
“Better safe than sorry isn’t a cliché. It’s a great reminder to always stay alert and diligent,” added Ellis Bruch, executive director for USU Public Safety, in a statement. “… We encourage everyone that if you see something, say something.”
Kirk was originally scheduled to speak at USU on Tuesday as part of his college campus tour. He was fatally shot during his appearance in an open courtyard at Utah Valley University on Sept. 10.
The suspect in the shooting, Tyler James Robinson, turned himself in and has since been charged with seven counts, including murder.
Kirk’s organization decided to move forward with its scheduled tour in his honor. Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, among others, spoke in Kirk’s place at the northern Utah campus Tuesday evening.
USU decided to move the event inside the Dee Glen Smith Spectrum in order to screen ticketed attendees and offer more security after the UVU shooting.