Gun sighting at Drayton Valley school a false alarm: Alberta RCMP

A school in western Alberta was put on lockdown for about an hour on Wednesday, after one student thought they saw another carrying a gun.

RCMP were called just before noon to a report of a male with a gun at St. Anthony School, a pre-school to Grade 8 Christian school with about 470 students.

Mounties arrived and learned a youth had been carrying a broom that a younger student had mistaken for a firearm.

RCMP said St. Anthony was locked down while it was searched, adding police swept the building and no guns were found on the property.

The nearby Frank Maddock High School, which has about 500 students in grades 9 to 12, was also placed in a hold and secure for about half an hour, according to the superintendent of the Wild Rose School Division.

Both schools in Drayton Valley were taken out of lockdown by about 1 p.m.

Drayton Valley is about 130 km southwest of Edmonton.

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