Bad vibrations: Buzzing inside mailbox shutters town square; sound was a medical alert pager

BELLEFONTE, Pa. – Police were picking up some bad vibrations from a buzzing mailbox in a Pennsylvania town, enough to prompt them to shut down the town square for a couple of hours.

Bellefonte police Chief Shawn Weaver says the “vibrating noise, like an alarm going off” was reported at about 10 a.m. Tuesday. Because police couldn’t be sure what was causing it, Penn State bomb experts and state police were called in, and a section of downtown was cordoned off until about 12:30 p.m.

It turns out someone had dropped a medical alert pager into the mailbox.

Police don’t yet know whether the device was dropped accidentally or put there by a prankster.

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