The Dane County Sheriff’s Department has declared a regional state of emergency for the neighborhood surrounding a Coca-Cola plant in Middleton after 48 cases of Mentos were found hidden within the manufacturing pipeline. The incident, confirmed as an act of terror by regional officials, was allegedly intended to set off a chemical chain reaction between the candies and the volumes of Coke produced within the plant. Thankfully, a vigilant floor worker discovered the cases of Mentos before the plant’s auto-filtration system turned on, engulfing the minty gummy candy in Coca-Cola and embroiling the entire plant in a sugary tsunami of carbonated death.
“They wanted to send the compound sky-high,” the sheriff’s department said. “It’s a miracle nobody was hurt.”
“Thankfully, someone spotted it and got everyone out of the plant,” a plant worker said. “We’d all be toast.”
Environmental analysts have projected the total damages from the possible incident in the hundreds of millions of dollars, ranging from the total demolition of the bottling plant to flooding and likely destruction of homes and enterprises in the area. The extent of the damage has not yet been calculated, as the boxes of Mentos were safely removed with a bomb disposal robot just prior to the opening of the plant.
“We need to work on our workplace safety,” an assistant plant manager said. “It’s clear that if the hydraulic systems had gone online, and the Coca-Cola had filled the pipeline where the suspects had placed the Mentos, none of us would be here today.”
“A plant in Dane County was closed today due to extenuating circumstances,” an official statement from the Coca-Cola company read. “We sincerely apologize for the closure and are compensating employees for lost time while the threat is addressed.”
“Coke and Mentos go well together,” a suspect was reported to have said in interrogation. “We just wanted to see them go boom.”
The 48 boxes of Mentos, allegedly slated for campus distribution, are being stored as evidence at the UW Police Headquarters.
The Perfetti Van Melle Corporation, the Italian conglomerate responsible for the manufacture and distribution of Mentos around the globe, declined a request to comment.
