Okay, let's start with the fact that the University of Utah has a nuclear reactor…on campus.
Next, there's 21-year old Meredith Miller, a nuclear engineering student that works on the reactor and apparently is an overzealous football fan.
She posted on the social media platform YikYak that if the University of Utah did not win their game, she would "detonate the nuclear reactor that is located in the University of Utah causing mass destruction."
Miller was arrested for making terrorist threats.
Although the student said her statement was a joke, Utah law doesn't distinguish between jokes and terroristic threats, even if those jokes/threats are not attempted or actually possible.
University Police Chief Jason Hinojosa said:
Just don't do it: Don't post a threat on social media. We have a zero-tolerance policy for these kinds of threats. In the age that we're living in, we have to take every threat seriously.
The Director of the Nuclear Engineering program Glenn Sjoden said that the reactor Is nearly impossible to damage since it immersed in a large water tank, not to mention all the alarms and security one would have to go through just to access it.
"The reactor is inherently safe. It provides a unique vehicle to performing state-of-the-art research in nuclear engineering and technology, and has been so for the past 50 years here in Salt Lake City.
"However, idle threats made to the facility are treated seriously, and we encourage folks to really bear in mind that nuclear facilities are always treated with the utmost respect and safety," Sjoden said. "Therefore, the government and law enforcement will take any action necessary to mitigate any threat made."
But just in case, the Utes did their part to avert Miller's threat and won that football game against San Diego state.
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