Tense Moments in the Downtown

A bomb threat was reported at the Downtown Guelph Canada Post office this morning. I’m not certain if a suspicious package was noticed or a threat was phoned in. Based upon some eyewitness accounts from Post Office staff it seems likely that a threat was called in. Police gathered around the Canada Post office around 11:00 this morning. Several officers took up outward facing positions at the entrance and prevented anyone from entering until a cordon was established.  As more officers arrived the area was taped off and traffic blocked from entering the square. A short time later the taped off areas were extended to the opposite side of the street.

Employees of Canada Post and BMO were evacuated along with some other smaller businesses in the area. With the downtown square being the central depot for Guelph Transit all buses were redirected to the River Run Center.

Crowds were kept back behind the cordoned areas until an Explosives Disposal team could arrive from Waterloo Regional Police with their disposal robot. The robot was unlimbered from the truck and prepped for deployment. A rather uneventful hour went by before the robot emerged again so that the team could make some adjustments and send the robot back in with some new accessories and what appeared to be a power cable.

After a few more trips out for tweaking the robot was sent in again and a bang was heard. I’m uncertain if the bang came from inside the building or was unrelated but shortly thereafter 4 officers entered the building followed by another police dog.

A bomb technician was seen outside the building inspecting some other items around the doors and windows of the post office shortly before all of the barricades were taken down and traffic granted access to the square again at around 4:00PM.