All Vermont prisons were locked down Wednesday, a scheduled event to allow correctional staff to check units for weapons or illegal substances, a state Department of Corrections spokesperson said.

The unusual procedure — the first statewide lockdown since the Covid-19 pandemic era — means that incarcerated Vermonters were confined to their cells while corrections staff searched all cells across the state, according to Haley Sommer, the department’s spokesperson.

In an interview Wednesday afternoon, Sommer could not immediately say when the lockdown began or whether it was still ongoing.

“This was a pre-planned event, essentially just to do a facility sweep and ensure that staff and the folks in our care and custody are safe,” Sommer said.

Sommer said she did not know how long Wednesday’s lockdown had been on the calendar. The procedure was not in response to any specific incident, she said, but she noted that several staff members in prisons in upstate New York had recently been hospitalized after being exposed to an unknown substance. Corrections staff are trying to prevent such incidents in Vermont, she said.

“It’s not uncommon at times for facilities to go under periods of restricted movement, and that could be for a variety of reasons, whether it’s planned building maintenance or things of that sort,” Sommer said. “But typically not often statewide.”

Efforts to reach Vermont Defender General Matt Valerio Wednesday afternoon were not immediately successful.