Barstable School Fire

11th December 2001

Then and Now

This is the back of 'A' block, the fire was started in the Art department. We now know that it was arson, the perpetrators were caught and punished. Apparently, they made three separate attempts to start the fire, climbing in and out of the art department window, watched quietly by the CCTV in their destructive stupidity.

This is the corridor into the Art department, this now looks quite different as the department is now open plan, from the third picture frame along on the right. The floor is swimming in approx. two inches of water.

Can you see the enormous crack in the supporting wall? The heat of the fire twisted and buckled the reinforcing metal inside the concrete walls.

This view is of the entrance to A4, this wall and door are no longer standing, instead, there is a folding panelled door, which was eventually fitted, nearly three years after the fire, open plan did not work in this room.

The ceiling in A3 was disintegrated by the heat of the fire. The pipes that are visible feed the gas supply to the science laboratories upstairs! The pipes are normally hidden in the ceiling. Note the hole (centre) where the concrete has crumbled completely.

 

This is the door to the storeroom, this no longer exists, the wall is gone and the space is quite wasted, an area where just a few computers are set up and pupils hang their coats. This was once a good sized storeroom, large enough to store pupils exam work as well as stock and still have enough room to double as an Art office.

This was the entrance to the kiln room, which has been replaced in it's original form.

The pottery inside the kiln was fired

but it got thrown away

Pity we couldn't get to it before that happened as some people pay good money for 'Raku' fired pottery.

Drama department did their Christmas pantomine rehearsals in 20 foot square classrooms, ever aware of the phrase "The show must go on" . They still managed to perform within the 'panto season'

.

We worked in the playground, in demountable classrooms for a year. Called 'cow sheds' in my day, they were a bit warmer and nicer than I remember.

Woolworths & Hobbycraft donated some basic art materials to get us going again
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