This Wednesday, November 6, the firefighters were alerted around 5 a.m. for a fire in a building at the Center school, rue Lapeyrère. The fire affected a storage room for educational materials on the ground floor and an office upstairs, and only caused material damage. The fire did not spread to the adjoining rooms, which normally accommodate students. The origin of the fire is currently still unknown.
However, soot and volatile particles were deposited in four classrooms in the upper part of the school. “This makes the building inaccessible,” explains Mayor Emmanuel Hanon. External companies must intervene to clean these fine particles, which are deposited everywhere. »And until this cleaning is completed, the classrooms will not be able to reopen their doors and the materials left inside will not be able to be recovered.
No school closure
But no closure is planned: children are welcomed this Thursday morning as usual. “The activity will continue on the same site, despite the lack of resources,” announced the mayor. Thus, the children will keep their “class groups” but will be relocated to the lower buildings. “There is a class downstairs which had been fitted out to accommodate the 5th class which was not affected. Then, the CPs of which there are only 19 will be able to sit in a room upstairs. In the other wing of the building there are also two rooms which will temporarily become classrooms. A large part of the courtyard and the toilets will be accessible,” explains Emmanuel Hanon.
Regarding the canteen, a stroke of luck: since Monday, it had been relocated to the self-service restaurant of the municipal restaurant: “There are 90 children registered in the canteen and we wanted them to have a better quality lunch break, so they couldn't no longer use the school dining room. It will be refitted into a classroom.”
The room also overlooks the playground inside the school. The classrooms are right next door.
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Duration unknown
An operation established urgently, during the day on Wednesday, but which allows the school to remain open. Emmanuel Hanon explains: “The extracurricular will last a little longer this Thursday morning to allow teachers to arrange the new rooms as they wish. I was against relocating classes to another school, it would have caused the children to lose their bearings.”
However, it is impossible to know how long this new organization will last: “We are doing everything to clean up as soon as possible. Our insurance offers us a company that can intervene but not before ten days. We are looking for something faster. » Privacy screens and barriers will be installed by City services in order to “minimize the impact on children”. The work is not a priority for the moment but the mayor recognizes “that there will be a lot to do. In particular the fire safety system which melted. Fortunately, the two buildings are disconnected, which is fortunate and allows us to keep the school open. »
The mayor concludes by saluting “the voluntary and exemplary educational community, the extracurricular team which mobilized to redevelop in record time, all the town hall services which responded and the National Education services which were very responsive and mobilized resources. It will be a Center school in a different way, but completely operational! »
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