WEST LEBANON — Mount Lebanon Elementary School went into a roughly hour-long lockdown Wednesday morning after a deer broke into the K-4 school in West Lebanon.
The deer entered the school “through a ground-level window in the entrance vestibule,” around 10:10 a.m., Lebanon School District Director of Facilities John Kerber wrote in an email Wednesday afternoon. The window it broke through was roughly 2 feet by 3 feet.
It then went down a hallway, eventually finding its way into an unoccupied staff room. School officials observed the deer on security footage and called the police. Aside from a few cuts to the deer, no one was injured and the deer did not interact with any students or staff.
“Believe it or not, the deer actually made her way down the hallway, and went into the staff room by herself,” Kerber wrote. “Once the deer was inside, staff members closed the door and waited for police to arrive.”
Students were in their classrooms at the time “and the school quickly went into lockdown,” Kerber wrote. Katie Roach, the school’s principal, sent out an alert to parents and guardians about the deer around 10:30 a.m., after school officials confirmed students and staff were safe, and that the deer was confined in the staff room, Kerber wrote.
Lebanon Police Chief Phil Roberts said police officers arrived at the scene within minutes of the call.
“Once it’s in the school, it’s kind of trapped,” Roberts said in a Wednesday afternoon phone interview. “The deer is obviously very frightened when it’s in there. It’s uncomfortable. It doesn’t want to be in there.”
Officers waited about an hour for a New Hampshire Fish and Game Department officer to assist them in removing the deer from the premises.
“Ultimately the deer was carried out by two Lebanon officers as well as the Fish and Game officer,” Roberts said, adding the deer did not have to be tranquilized to be removed from the school.
He estimated that the deer, a doe, weighed around 80 to 90 lbs. Two Lebanon officers held the woodland creature’s back legs to prevent it from kicking.
“It had some cuts from the glass, but it gladly ran off into the woods,” behind the school, Roberts said. “It wasn’t a chaotic scene.”
While officers, including himself, had seen videos of deer and other wildlife entering buildings where they do not belong, Roberts — who has been with the Lebanon Police Department for around 25 years — said he believed it was the first call of its kind for the department.
Roach sent out another alert to families around 11:30 a.m. after officers removed the deer from the school and the lockdown was over.
School District facilities staff boarded up the broken window with a piece of plywood, Kerber said. They are working on gathering quotes for a replacement pane so that the district can order one “as soon as possible.”
Some teachers took the opportunity to incorporate the trespasser into their lessons. Classes sang songs about deer during their closing circle activities at the end of the school day, Kerber said, referencing information he received from Roach.
“Additionally, teachers have discussed a potential writing prompt involving the deer who ‘visited’ Mount Leb, and they are already looking for books about deer in schools that we could share with students,” Kerber wrote.
