After a “suspicious substance” was found in the U.S. Russell Senate office building late Wednesday in Washington, an alert was sounded and it was evacuated, police said.
Around 200 people, including about a dozen senators, were moved into a Capitol parking lot for three hours and allowed to return to their offices after it was determined to be harmless material and not a nerve agent as was initially suspected.
Sgt. Kimberly Schneider of U.S. Capitol police, speaking to reporters, said: “Our test results have been cleared and all the test results are actually negative. Sometimes you might have a cleaning solvent which may set off a false alarm.”
U.S. Capitol Police Chief Terrance Gainer confirmd that it was only vapor.
Senator Jeff Sessions, R-Alabama, who was one of the evacuees, said: “We had this warning system work. People in the building followed the directions promptly. There was no panic, no running, no upset or anything like that.”
Panic set in in this building only a block way from Capitol as an alarm went off just before 7 p.m.
The Capitol and the adjacent government office buildings are not unfamiliar to evacuations, which have happened several times and all alerts turned out to be false alarms.
Security has been tightened at all government buildings following the September 11 terrorist attacks in 2001.
Senator Judd Gregg, R-New Hampshire, another of the senators evacuated from the building, said: “One of the alarm systems that tests air quality went off with a positive reading, and then it went off again with a positive reading, so I guess they thought it was serious enough that they had to take very aggressive action.”
He added: “We've been through a lot of these things in the Capitol. It's unfortunately a sign of the times.”
Earlier in October 2002, just a month after the terrorist attacks, a letter laced with anthrax prompted shutting down of Congress briefly. Five people were killed and 17 fell ill across the nation after they came into contact with letters containing anthrax.
