SALISBURY, N.C. — Police have given a Salisbury medical center the all-clear to return to normal operations after a bomb threat.
A spokesman with the Salisbury VA Health Care System said someone called the W.G. (Bill) Hefner Veterans Affairs Medical Center on Brenner Avenue at 3:30 a.m. Thursday and said there was a bomb in building No. 2.
The caller, who officials said was upset his brother had been denied a disability check, said the bomb would go off at 9 a.m.
The building was evacuated, with 29 patients sent to a gym on the medical campus and five taken by ambulance to another local hospital.
Rowan County police swept the building with bomb-sniffing dogs. The spokesman said federal VA police also conducted a room-to-room search. Nothing turned up in the searches.
"We take every threat seriously. We're a health care facility. We have to maintain the safety of our patients," said VA public information officer Carol Waters.
This is the second bomb threat at the VA hospital this year. In April, the hospital evacuated several buildings as officers searched for a bomb but never found one.
Officials told Eyewitness News the call came from a payphone in either East Spencer or Landis. Police are still investigating who may have made the call.
WSOC
