A WHITEHILL special constable has received a top award from Superintendent Bob Rose, the man in charge of policing in central Hampshire, following a bomb hoax at an Alton nightclub. Hundreds of clubbers had to be evacuated when police received an anonymous tip-off that a bomb had been planted in Minnesota's in Alton on one of the busiest nights of the week. Up to 700 people were inside the club in Lower Turk Street when the call was made from a phone box in the town at midnight on a Friday night. A group of special constables were sent to evacuate the club, before a sweep was made of the premises. Section officer Dave Buckland, who is responsible for special constables in the Alton area, was first on the scene. He said: "I was already in High Street so I took the vehicle to just outside the club, spoke to the door staff and I initially asked them if they had barred anyone that night. "At the back of my mind I was thinking 'this is a hoax. Somebody has been barred and they are setting it up' but I was also thinking 'this could be real' and because of what goes on in this country nowadays any threat like this is taken very seriously. "The door staff said they could not recall anyone being barred that evening. I then told them we had received a 999 call saying there was a bomb on the premises so could we evacuate the club as soon as possible. "They called the DJ and he turned off the music and then put the overhead lights on. I got all the clubbers out on to the street and then the other seven specials, two from Whitehill and five from Alton, turned up and we got the clubbers moving down the street and away from the club. "The door staff did a very good job in assisting us - all the clubbers were naturally a bit upset at heaving to leave, but everyone did. In about 10 minutes we had everyone out. "Once we had got everyone dispersed a sergeant from Whitehill turned up and she did a sweep of the club with the head doorman which took 20 minutes. There are not many places that the public have access to that they could hide anything in. |The sweep did not turn up anything, and we realised it was a hoax and made the decision to close the club for the night." While the evacuation procedure was set in motion by section officer Buckland, Pc Simon Deer, of Alton Police, sealed off the telephone box where the 999 call had been made from. "If it had been a real bomb, the scenes of crime officers would have been called because the person who made the call would have had information. We would have wanted to speak to them as there might have been some DNA on the phone, which would have helped us trace them," he said. This was the first time that section officer Buckland had attended an incident of this kind in more than a decade of working as a special. He said: "It was quite nerve-racking, as it was the first time I had ever been to a bomb threat in my 13 years as a special. We do get a certain amount of training on it, but it is not something we have to deal with on a regular basis. "I just went on to autopilot. My initial priority was to get everyone out of the building in case it was not a hoax." Section officer Buckland's quick and accurate thinking when dealing with the threat on April 15 has led him to receive a top award. Section officer Buckland was one of four specials to receive a prestigious certificate from Superintendent Rose at the BCU (Basic Command Unit) Commanders' Congratulations ceremony held in Winchester recently. The others were section officer Phil Keeling, section officer's Buckland's counterpart in the Whitehill and Petersfield areas, and divisional officers Dave Johns and Tom Haye, who oversee the work of the specials in Alton, Whitehill and Petersfield. All four were particularly praised for their hardwork in dealing with the bomb threat. The officers were nominated by Inspector Tony Tipping, of Alton Police, not only for their hard work, but also for that of their colleagues across the area. "We all got it for the work and effort we have put in helping the regular force at weekends," section officer Buckland said. "Inspector Tipping put us forward for it. He said everybody had done so much and he wanted to put us all forward. He put the line managers forward to represent the work of all the special constables. "I got it the award on behalf of the rest of the specials of Alton, Phil Keeling got it on behalf of Whitehill and Petersfield and Dave Johns and Tom Haye got it because they oversee the whole of the Alton, Whitehill and Petersfield side of central Hampshire." Section officer Buckland said he felt privileged to receive the award. "All our work is totally voluntary so when you get a little something like that, it shows that the regular force do appreciate you," he said. We have a good working relationship with the regular force but when you get this, it shows their appreciation."
