Fallen Tree Branch at SAMO High Triggers Panic

By Jorge Casuso

Paramedics rushed to Santa Monica High School Friday afternoon and half a dozen news helicopters circled overhead as the school switchboard lit up.

But it wasn't a shooting that drew all the attention. It was a tree limb.

The limb, which broke off of a tree near the music building, landed on six students, who were taken to the hospital as part of a routine procedure by the district. One of the children may have been slightly injured, officials said.

"I couldn't believe it," said District Superintendent Neil Schmidt. "Every media station in the world inundated us with phone calls. Is there a shooting?" Schmidt said they wanted to know.

The television crews were responding to calls for service on the police scanner, and the incident escalated when squad cars and fire trucks arrived at the scene.

By 4 p.m., the incident was being broadcast on the early television newscasts.