A friend of mine had his own brush with the anthrax craziness yesterday and this morning. His wife recently paid for her daughter's girl scout activities with a check and the girl scout troup leader sent all the checks in at once. Apparently, my friend's check fell out of the envelope and the post office mailed it back to them using the address on the check. On the back of the envelope, there was a little form note that described the contents of the package and why it was returned. A <i>hand-written</i> note said, "anthrax." He took it down to police this morning and they closed off the entire police station. Employees had to wait outside for half an hour while the HASMAT teams inspected the package and took it to the lab. They said the FBI would investigate and prosecute everyone responsible. They said they doubt that it had any anthrax. There was no powder or any other substance in the envelope but they told his wife to wash her hands up to her elbows in diluted bleach, take a hot shower and wash her clothes in hot water and bleach just as a precaution. Damn! How insane is all that? Whoever that idiot was at the PO that thought writing "anthrax" would be funny is in deep ****!
Seems like your friend made a mistake. You say he took the possibly anthrax contaminated package down to the police station? They have stated many times that you should leave it where you found it, evacuate, and then contact authorities. Otherwise, he could have spread the contamination to the whole police station. I'm sure panick got the best of him which is understandable...but it's scary that if it were anthrax and he's taking the package to unsuspecting people...then says..."This letter may have Anthrax in it". Then what? The whole police station is shut down, hazmat hoses down everyone, and they all go on antibiotics. And then they still have to deal with your friend's house after that.... That said...I hope everyone is okay and it is a false alarm. Surf
that's freakin' crazy and stupid! my wife had her own anthrax scare yesterday, being out of town for the past few days kept her out of her office building, when she returned yesterday in the afternoon there were HAZMAT (Hazardous Materials) Teams, police, EMT's and HFD all outside. The building was closed (with folks inside) because someone reported white powder in the elevator. Turns out construction crews on one of the floors were moving pieces of drywall and the drywall chalk residue was left behind in the elevator... crazy! rH
I received a prank call the other night from what sounded like a teenager with perhaps some faint giggling in the background. He said that he was infected with anthrax and had infected my family. I refused to act upset because I'm not upset over the anthrax affair, with only one fatality and no one else really sick in the whole country. After repeated attempts to scare me, I told him I didn't believe him and would take anti-biotics if necessary. Laughed him off and told him to have a nice night. Later,after talking to my wife who got upset I realized I should have reported this or at least threatened to have the call traced. The kid told me he was from Angleton for some reason.
