RAINSTORM CAUSES HAVOC AT BEGORO PRESBY SHS (PAGE 42, MAY 20, 2010)

A SEVERE rainstorm completely ripped off the roofs of four classrooms of the Begoro Presbyterian Senior High School (SHS) last Monday, injuring some of the students in the process.
Three students sustained deep cuts on the head, arm and the rib while 11 others were traumatised in the incident, which occurred at exactly 10.35 a.m. when the students were in their classrooms.
All the 14 students were rushed to the Begoro District Hospital, where they were admitted and treated to enable them to overcome the trauma they had gone through during the incident.
The students sustained the injuries and shock when they ran helter-skelter, amidst desperate screams of help, out of their make-shift dwarf-walled pavilion classrooms, which had their roofs ripped off by the rainstorm.
The students, mostly girls, were reported to have quickly dashed out of their classrooms in a bid to salvage their dresses, which they had then dried on lines near the girls’ dormitory.
However, some of them were unfortunately struck by some of the flying objects, including the branches of some of the teak trees planted on the school compound.
The force of the rainstorm pulled down portions of the classroom block and some of the teak trees, which prevented some of the flying roofing sheets from causing an otherwise serious injuries to the students and damages to other buildings at the school.
When the District Chief Executive for Fanteakwa, Mr Abass Fuseini Sbaab, visited the school immediately after the incident, it was realised that most of the wood used for roofing the classrooms were termite infested.
The Assistant Headmaster of the school, Mr David Odjijah told the Daily Graphic that but for the presence of a number of teak trees on the school compound, the wreck caused by the rainstorm could have been worse.
According to him, the school lacked a decent classroom block for effective teaching and learning.
Mr Odjijah, therefore, appealed to the authorities to provide the school with a 24-unit classroom block to prevent the recurrence of such a disaster in the future.
Mr Sbaab assured the management of the school that the assembly would bear all the medical expenses incurred by injured students.
He also gave an assurance that the assembly would send labourers and carpenters to the school to clear the debris after which the assembly’s engineers would assess the cost of re-roofing the damaged classroom blocks.