The unexpected discovery of ammunition left over from a police training exercise caused a lockdown on the first day of classes at the Memorial Middle School last week.

On Wednesday, Aug. 30, a copier technician found what Hull Police described as a “training round” that had been used in an active-shooter drill held on the eighth-grade floor of the school earlier in the summer.

“Please note that these training rounds do not have the capability to leave the barrel and become a projectile,” Police Chief John Dunn and Superintendent of Schools Judith Kuehn said in a joint statement on the incident. “This resulted in a short lockdown of the school out of an abundance of caution for our students and staff. When officers responded to the school, they immediately identified that it was a training round, and the lockdown was ended.”

On the next day, a teacher found more training rounds in a plastic cup.

“We did not call for a lockdown at this point because we recognized the items,” Dunn and Kuehn said in the statement. “The school resource officer and the lead police instructor for the active shooter training event conducted a protective sweep of the school on Thursday afternoon to make sure no other items related to the drill were left behind.”

The police drill was conducted earlier in the summer; the statement did not indicate why the leftover ammunition was not discovered prior to the opening of the school year.

“The Hull Police Department and the Hull Public Schools would like to apologize to parents and students for any alarm this caused,” the chief and superintendent said. “We also want to stress that at no point were any students, teachers or school personnel in danger.”

The school department and police department said they would coordinate on future drills in the buildings to prevent similar situations from occurring.

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