Fire destroys classrooms

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 33096, 11 December 1972, Page 18

Fire destroys classrooms

(New Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, December 10. A fire razed three classrooms at the Khandallah Primary School this evening and destroyed the library, staff quarters, and headmaster’s study.

The new school hall was badly damaged, and two other classrooms were damaged. A fire recently destroyed a large section of the Miramar School.

I The acting divisional fire i [ officer for Wellington (Mr F. I . T. Little) said the school was' ’ well alight when fire engines arrived. Mr Little said he could see 1 the blaze in the sky from the 5 Wellington City Fire Station (about five miles away. The (firemen concentrated on saving the new portion of the school, the infant block and the two remaining classrooms. He did not know the cause of the fire. The chairman of the Khandallah School Committee (Mr A. A. Dean) said that the firemen had done a great job in saving the new portion of the school, and that some of the assembly hall might be salvaged. The part of the old school gutted by fire was to have been renovated next year.

Mr Dean said it was probable that pupils of the school would begin their Christmas holidays a week early. Mr Dean said it was particularly sad to see the school’s hall and extensive library, which had been built after fund-raising efforts by Khandallah people, destroyed in minutes. The police are investigating.