ROANOKE TIMES 
                      Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times

DATE: Friday, March 15, 1996                 TAG: 9603150056
SECTION: VIRGINIA                 PAGE: C-5  EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: DIANE STRUZZI STAFF WRITER 

BOMB THREAT EMPTIES WILLIAM BYRD FORMER AMBASSADOR TO KUWAIT HAD JUST LEFT HIGH SCHOOL BUILDING

A bomb threat forced evacuation of William Byrd High School on Thursday morning, disrupting classes for two hours.

A secretary in the school office received the call at 11:03 a.m. The caller, using much profanity, claimed there was a bomb in the building at 2902 Washington Ave. in Vinton, according to Roanoke County Sgt. Jeff Swortzel.

The threat came minutes after Nathaniel Howell, former U.S. ambassador to Kuwait, finished a speech to the senior government classes and left the school.

The caller did not mention Howell's name, and it was later determined that Howell's presentation had nothing to do with the threat.

Assistant Principal Richard Turner said authorities traced the call to a convenience store in Bedford County, where a clerk had seen several young people running from the area at the time the call was placed.

Swortzel would not comment about any developments in the case. He would say only that investigators are following leads. No arrests had been made as of Thursday afternoon.

Shortly after the threat, about 1,000 students and 100 staff members were evacuated to the school's football stadium. Roanoke County police and fire officials, along with a Virginia State Police bomb technician and a bomb-sniffing dog, searched the school. No bomb was found.

The last time the school had a bomb threat was about three years ago, Turner said.

Howell has been visiting all four Roanoke County high schools this week discussing politics and terrorism in the Middle East. He is a director of Arabian Peninsula and Gulf Studies at the University of Virginia and was U.S. ambassador to Kuwait during the invasion by Iraq in 1990.

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