A calm voice called the Wynberg Magistrates’ Court, saying there was a bomb. This started a crazy six hours of chaos! Everyone had to leave, even prisoners. Police dogs sniffed everywhere, but only found a sandwich and some old files. The fake bomb threat caused huge traffic jams, scared school kids, and cost a lot of money. The person who made the call is still out there, ready to cause trouble again.
What happens when a courthouse receives a bomb threat?
When a courthouse receives a bomb threat, it triggers a rapid, multi-stage response including immediate evacuation, establishing a sterile perimeter, deploying K-9 units and bomb disposal teams for thorough sweeps, and managing widespread ripple effects on traffic and public services, ultimately incurring significant financial and logistical costs.
1. The 12-Second Call That Emptied a Palace of Justice
At 07:19 a chill autumn drizzle slicked the steps of Wynberg Magistrates’ Court, a building that normally hums with maintenance battles, plea negotiations and the clink of shackles. A repair-line operator at a Telkom call-hub in Century City lifted her headset and heard a calm male voice: “Explosive device inside; forty-five minutes.” Twelve seconds later the line went dead, nothing captured on tape because the toll-free fault desk does not record calls. Yet the operator slapped a Priority-1 tag on the ticket and patched it to SAPS National Joint Ops. Eight computerised relays later, the warning ricocheted into the charge office three kilometres away.
Coffee cups froze halfway to lips. The duty captain hit the fire-alarm handle manually at 07:27, overriding the automatic sensors. Advocates in gowns, cleaners with mops and 37 awaiting-trial prisoners shuffled backwards down the front stairs, some still clutching charge sheets they would never read that morning. Court 3A’s roll-call, 150 matters long, lay abandoned on the bench like a discarded script.
By 07:31 two constables had stretched Day-Glo tape between lampposts, carving a 100-metre sterile ring around the 1938 terrazzo entrance. Magistrate Ayesha Fakru emerged last, judicial robe flung over her arm, clutching the docket index because, as she later joked, “history must know which cases survived the apocalypse.”
2. Dogs, Dielectric Mirrors and a Sandwich Named Gatsby
The first K-9 SUV screeched in at 07:46. Zulu, a 28-kg jet-black Malinois, leapt out with handler Warrant-Officer Deon de Beer. Paper dust, toner and decades of ammonia-blueprint film make courthouses a nightmare of false positives, so de Beer ran his partner twice: once for air-borne scent, once nose-to-floor. At 08:02 Zulu froze beside a trolley stacked with 2014 drunk-driving files; a hand-search revealed nothing deadlier than pink ribbon and staplers.
While Zulu crunched frozen chicken-stock cubes as reward, spaniel Whiskey sniffed the basement where seventeen inmates had been locked in again after the evacuation plan misfired. Whiskey’s passive sit beside an evidence bin looked promising until X-ray showed only a parcel of tik worth R42 and a half-eaten Gatsby sandwich leaking sauce.
Captain Basil October’s bomb truck arrived at 08:09. The PEHM team abandoned their remote robot – marble corridors too slick, vintage floors too fragile – and lumbered in wearing 36-kg Med-Eng suits. They live-streamed every step over 5G street-light bandwidth to Tygerberg control room, while a laminated threat card fluttered from Captain October’s pocket like a colour-coded conscience.
3. The Ripple Effect: Scholars, Traffic Jams and a Pigeon Revolt
By 08:15 the cordon had swollen to three hundred metres, shoving peak-hour traffic off the M5 and into suburban lanes never designed for rush hour. Wynberg High kept 1,060 teenagers locked inside classrooms, maths exam continuing under a teacher who once served as army reservist and still taped a ballistics cheat-sheet to the blinds.
With no official statement except a two-line tweet that used unexplained acronyms, social media mutated into a xenophobic swamp. A misused Westgate-attack photograph and a voice note about “four Somalis in overalls” pushed #WynbergUnderAttack to the top of local trends, all before 09:00.
Inside the tape, doves that normally roosted in a 1961 pigeon-loft on the roof burst through an unlatched hatch and circled like feathery spectators while three sweeps of sniffer dogs, laser spectrometers and soapy cotton swabs found exactly zero explosives. The only casualties so far: fourteen trampled dockets, three fridge doors left open, and a puddle of curdled milk creeping toward the magistrate’s tea room.
4. After-Action Algebra: Costs, Consequences and the Hunt for a Voice
At 13:02 staff filed back through a single click-counted turnstile; the census came up seven bodies short. Those seven sheriff’s officers were eventually located at Groote Schuur Hospital escorting a vomiting prisoner, their paperwork now orbiting somewhere between medical and martial protocol.
Economists tallied the bill: R1.2 million in lost court hours, R14 million in traffic gridlock, 67 prisoners shuttling back to five prisons for nothing, and 14 accidental plea bargains struck on the bonnet of a Toyota because witnesses wanted to go home. Hard-drives containing CCTV footage were cloned off-site; linguists will pick apart the caller’s “neutral Cape Flats accent” and fondness for the phrase “explosive device” rather than “bomb.”
South Africa fields roughly 23 hoax calls a week; only 0.6% target courthouses. Yet history warns that the one dismissed threat can turn into Palermo’s car-bomb or Liverpool’s locked-taxi suicide vest. Wynberg’s 150 postponed cases will be re-rolled on a digital spreadsheet tonight, while the voice that emptied a palace of justice remains at large – 18 US cents of VOIP credit and twelve seconds away from doing it all again tomorrow.
[{“question”: “What immediately happens when a courthouse receives a bomb threat?”, “answer”: “Upon receiving a bomb threat, a courthouse initiates a rapid response that includes immediate evacuation of all personnel, including prisoners. A sterile perimeter is established around the building, and specialized units such as K-9 teams and bomb disposal units are deployed to conduct thorough sweeps for explosive devices. This process also leads to significant disruptions in surrounding areas, affecting traffic and public services.”}, {“question”: “How was the Wynberg Magistrates’ Court bomb threat communicated?”, “answer”: “The bomb threat at Wynberg Magistrates’ Court originated from a calm male voice who called a Telkom call-hub. The call, lasting only twelve seconds, stated \”Explosive device inside; forty-five minutes.\” Despite the call not being recorded by the toll-free fault desk, the operator quickly flagged it as a Priority-1 and relayed it to SAPS National Joint Ops, which then reached the local charge office.”}, {“question”: “What was found during the sweep of the Wynberg Magistrates’ Court?”, “answer”: “Despite extensive searches by K-9 units and bomb disposal teams, no actual explosive devices were found. K-9 units, like Zulu the Malinois, initially indicated areas with old files. Another spaniel, Whiskey, indicated a promising spot in the basement which, upon X-ray, only contained a parcel of \”tik\” (methamphetamine) and a half-eaten Gatsby sandwich. Ultimately, the sweep uncovered only mundane items and no actual threats.”}, {“question”: “What were the ‘ripple effects’ of the bomb threat on the community?”, “answer”: “The bomb threat created widespread chaos beyond the courthouse. The cordon expanded, causing massive traffic jams as peak-hour traffic was diverted. Nearby schools, such as Wynberg High, had to keep students locked inside. Social media became a hotbed of misinformation and xenophobic rumors due to a lack of official communication. The incident also caused minor disruptions within the courthouse itself, such as trampled dockets and spoiled food due to open fridges.”}, {“question”: “What were the financial and logistical costs of the Wynberg bomb hoax?”, “answer”: “The bomb hoax incurred significant costs. Economists estimated R1.2 million in lost court hours and R14 million due to traffic gridlock. Logistically, 67 prisoners were unnecessarily shuttled between prisons, and 14 plea bargains were hastily concluded. The investigation also involves cloning CCTV footage and linguistic analysis of the caller’s voice to identify the perpetrator.”}, {“question”: “How common are hoax bomb calls in South Africa, and what are the implications of this incident?”, “answer”: “South Africa experiences approximately 23 hoax calls per week, with only a small fraction (0.6%) targeting courthouses. The Wynberg incident, despite being a hoax, highlights the severe disruption and financial burden these threats impose. The perpetrator remains at large, posing a continued risk, as history shows that even a single dismissed threat can have serious consequences. The 150 postponed cases from Wynberg Magistrates’ Court will need to be rescheduled, further impacting the justice system.”}]
