ST. MARY’S CITY (April 16, 2005) --- Normally a college prank might result in an official action of a week’s suspension or maybe hard time at the library but today’s incident at the picturesque Harvard on the St. Mary’s turned out to be a debacle of the highest degree, perhaps funny except to the taxpayers.

Hordes of police, firefighters and fire marshals swarmed to St. Mary’s College of Maryland for a report of suspicious devices, which some genius believed, could be pipe bombs.

After all the Kings men showed in flack jackets, wearing bullet proof vests, riot gear, hauling in K-9 dogs from St. Mary’s and Charles Counties, deputies from remote donut shops long ago forgotten by time, the stage was set.

Even a News Channel 8 satellite tv truck, apparently lost for any news on this pretty Saturday morning, arrived to shoot back this latest breaking story to the WJLA studios in Roslyn.

A Maryland State Police helicopter was used to fly in a second set of State Fire Marshal investigators since there were two of the potentionally dangerous devices.

When all was said and done, all was clearly not said, as a large conference of cops was called for in the Townhouse square where some official congratulated the assembled law officers for a job well done.

Done is a good word to use here in St. Mary’s City as the official word on the unusual device was that it was not dangerous unless used in a personal way.

The "pipe bombs" were simply found to be vibratory devices, not exactly standard issue to be found in college dorms except for those who perhaps aren’t dating as much as others.

After the vibrators were properly disposed of by the State Fire Marshal bomb squad, the legions of police officers, along with the three or four ambulances and several fire trucks which had been standing by, were all dismissed.

There is no official word on whether the ‘vibratory devices’ were rendered useless to their owner and what the cost of replacements would be.