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Fifty AP U.S. History scores were canceled Thursday after a student reportedly breathed with unusual force during the document-based question section in McLean’s Lower Gym.

The disruption came moments after students opened their DBQ packets. Several test takers looked up simultaneously, witnesses said, prompting proctor and AP Chemistry teacher Linda Hargrove to stop near the second row and document the incident on a pink form.

“At approximately 9:47 a.m., I heard one full breath from the second row,” Hargrove said. “Absolutely unprecedented.”

Attention soon turned to junior Jackson Smith, who had been seated in chair 141. By the end of the school day, passing students were reportedly taking exaggerated shallow breaths near him before laughing and moving along.

Smith rejected responsibility for the canceled scores.

“I would never intentionally breathe during a nationally administered exam,” he said.

The decision alarmed students who had spent months completing Bluebook practice exams, studying Supreme Court cases and mastering ways to work the Market Revolution into nearly any DBQ.

Junior Maya Patel said the cancellation erased weeks of preparation.

“I swear I had a five in the bag,” Patel said. “Until it got sucked away by Jackson’s breath.”

McLean’s College and Career Center met with the affected students Friday to review possible makeup arrangements and discuss concerns about college credit.

Counselor Amber Jensen reassured students that a single test would not determine their futures. She also pointed to the Common Application’s additional-information section as a place to explain that a score had been canceled because another student breathed.

By lunch, signs throughout the Lower Gym warned students to “Turn Lungs Off,” declared “No Carbon Dioxide Allowed” and instructed them to “Please Respire Off School Grounds.” Hargrove and other proctors said the precautions were intended to prevent another incident during the afternoon AP Music Theory exam.

The College Board did not respond to questions about whether future exams could be held somewhere less accommodating to respiration.

Hargrove suggested outer space as one possible alternative, noting that nobody she knows can breathe there.

Students scheduled to take AP Biology at 8 a.m. the following morning began devising protections of their own. Three were seen outside the Yellow Hallway placing Scotch tape over their nostrils, while two others experimented with clothespins borrowed from the art room.

Although official guidance had yet to arrive, Hargrove praised the students’ solution: “No nose, no problem.”