--- title: White House Lockdown: Obama on Trip to Selma description: The White House was put on lockdown Saturday morning as President Obama prepared to head to Selma for the 50th anniversary of Bloody Sunday. canonical: https://time.com/3736343/white-house-lockdown/ author: NBC News article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-03-07T17:45:46.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-22T04:59:32.457Z article:section: Politics og:title: White House Lockdown: Obama on Trip to Selma og:description: The White House was put on lockdown Saturday morning as President Obama prepared to head to Selma for the 50th anniversary of Bloody Sunday. og:url: https://time.com/3736343/white-house-lockdown/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: White House Lockdown: Obama on Trip to Selma twitter:description: The White House was put on lockdown Saturday morning as President Obama prepared to head to Selma for the 50th anniversary of Bloody Sunday. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # White House on Lockdown After Nearby Vendor Explosion by [NBC News](https://time.com/author/nbc-news/) ## NBC News Mar 7, 2015 5:45 PM UTC by [NBC News](https://time.com/author/nbc-news/) ## NBC News Mar 7, 2015 5:45 PM UTC The White House was put on lockdown Saturday morning after a nearby food vendor cart suffered a small explosion, causing a security sweep before President Barack Obama and his family were about to leave for Selma, Alabama, according to a White House pool report. Photos posted on Twitter from Will Sweet show heavy smoke from one of the food locations in the 400 block of 15th Street, Northwest on Saturday morning. D.C. fire officials said the fire was extinguished and one person was evaluated on the scene, but not transported to a hospital. Secret Service spokesman Brian Leary told The Associated Press around the same time, a bomb-sniffing dog detected something on a vehicle nearby. [Read the rest of the story from our partners at NBC News](http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Small-Explosion-near-White-House-295478521.html) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3736343/white-house-lockdown/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3736343/white-house-lockdown/"},"headline":"White House on Lockdown After Nearby Vendor Explosion","datePublished":"2015-03-07T17:45:46.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-22T04:59:32.457Z","description":"A bomb-sniffing dog detected something on a vehicle nearby","url":"https://time.com/3736343/white-house-lockdown/","keywords":["The White House"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"NBC News","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/nbc-news/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/the-white-house/","name":"The White House"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3736343/white-house-lockdown/","name":"White House on Lockdown After Nearby Vendor Explosion"}}]}] ```