Students at Oregon State University Urged to ‘Avoid All Robots’ After Bomb Threat Prank

A woman walks her dogs past Starship delivery robots waiting for orders in Milton Keynes, England, on July 23, 2020. Darren Staples/Getty Images

Students at Oregon State University’s (OSU) campus in Corvallis on Tuesday were told to avoid all food delivery robots due to a bomb threat that was later revealed to be a prank.

OSU posted an emergency alert on X, formerly known as Twitter, that there was a bomb threat involving the Starship food delivery robots and urged students to “avoid all robots until further notice.”

“Do not open robots. Avoid all robots until further notice. Public Safety is responding,” it stated.

The Department of Public Safety has remotely isolated the robots in a safe location and was investigating, the university said in another update. Students were also advised to “remain vigilant for suspicious activity.”

Over an hour later, OSU said the “emergency was over” and that students could “resume normal activities” while the robots were being inspected. The university later said the robots would be back in service.

A person believed to be responsible for the bomb threat has been arrested following an investigation, The Associated Press reported, citing university officials. The university did not disclose the identity of the individual.

Starship Technologies, the San Francisco-based company that makes the robots, later revealed that a student at the university had sent a bomb threat via social media involving Starship’s robots on campus.

The company noted that it had suspended its service while cooperating with law enforcement and the university.

“While the student has subsequently stated this is a joke and a prank, Starship suspended the service,” Starship Technologies said in a statement.

Starship Technologies later provided an update, stating that the robots would be back in service at OSU later in the day, as local authorities had given an all-clear.

Starship Technologies has contracted with the university’s housing and dining services since 2020. About 75 robots deliver food to people on campus who order it, university officials said. These robots are equipped with sensors and 12 cameras, enabling them to navigate around objects.

The company said in August that its fleet of more than 2,000 robots had rolled onto nearly 50 college campuses in the United States, serving over 1.1 million students. Most recently, Starship Technologies launched a robot delivery service at the University of Akron, Ohio.

Starship Technologies said that its zero-emission robots make “more than 150,000 road crossings every day” and have completed over 5 million commercial deliveries and traveled more than 6 million miles globally, “more than any other autonomous delivery provider.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.