THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, September 2, 1995 TAG: 9509020410
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY STEVE STONE AND LARRY W. BROWN, STAFF WRITERS
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Long : 193 lines
An arsonist may be responsible for a blaze that destroyed part of Princess Anne High School early Friday.
``The fire is of a suspicious nature,'' Fire Department spokesman Mike Wade said Friday night. Investigators will return to the rubble today in hopes of firming up the cause.
In the meantime, with a major part of their school in ruins, Princess Anne students will start classes a week late and will be scattered about the city.
Flames ravaged the heart of the school in the predqwn hours, destroying a newly renovated library and 17 classrooms and heavily damaging the cafeteria, administrative offices, computer labs and more classrooms.
Firefighters were frustrated in repeated efforts to douse the three-alarm blaze that burned out of control for more than five hours.
The first alarm came at 1:36 a.m. More than 50 firefighters eventually responded; six were slightly injured.
As crews searched the wreckage for hot spots, investigators started hunting for the cause of the largest fire in the Virginia Beach school system's history.
Coming just four days before the opening of fall classes, the blaze left officials scrambling to arrange for the education of more than 2,700 students who call ``P.A.'' home.
Students and staff could only stand by helplessly, some near tears, as flames turned the night sky orange and gutted the anchor structure of the city's oldest operating high school.
``It hurts me inside . . . that such great memories are being lost,'' said Amber Kennedy, a 16-year-old junior at Princess Anne who watched with her mother and brother.
Kennedy recalled a long-time English teacher who kept poems and essays from current and former students in her classroom. It was among those ablaze.
``Just to think of one poem being burned, it's heartbreaking,'' Kennedy said.
``When you were little, you thought it would be neat if the school burned down,'' Kennedy said. ``But you look at it now . . . .''
The area most heavily damaged is about one-third of the school's total space, said John Curtin, the assistant principal.
``It's terrible,'' Curtin said. ``We've been over here working so hard trying to get the school ready for the kids.''
The blaze appeared to have started just outside the library on the second floor of the building's west end. It spread through the library and down the length of the school's original wing, built in 1954.
Notice of the fire came when a sensor in the school set off an alarm at the Virginia Beach emergency communications center. Eventually, more than 10 fire trucks, backed by rescue squads and a hazardous materials team, were on the scene.
The blaze did not reach any science labs where potentially volatile and hazardous chemicals might have created additional problems. But that was about the only break firefighters had. They faced a trio of enemies: the flames, the wind and a building seemingly designed to frustrate them at every turn.
For about the first hour, from the outside, it appeared the crews were getting the upper hand. But increasingly harried radio chatter told another story.
``We've got a hell of a fire. . . we can't stop it,'' said a frustrated Battalion Chief Chase Sergeant.
By 4 a.m., it became evident that the battle was being lost. The ``slap, crash'' sound of firefighters smashing plate glass windows rattled over the roar of fire truck engines and high-pressure hoses. With each new opening, a plume of milky-brown smoke oozed skyward.
Flames framed doorways, blackboards and bookcases.
On the roof where it had briefly seemed that flames were quelled, they suddenly ushered forth anew.
``It's bad and it's getting worse,'' Sergeant said on another brief visit outside. ``The heat is intense. It rolls over your head and it's just getting hotter and hotter.
``We want to put the fire out, but we just can't.''
Sergeant later said the smoke was so thick that firefighters standing shoulder-to-shoulder could not see each other, and had to feel their way around, using lockers as a guide.
The flames found escape from firefighters' water and tools in a 4-foot space between the roof and the ceiling. Filled with insulation and other fire fuel, the void - running the length and width of the building - was sandwiched above and below by corrugated steel.
Falling, flaming debris carried the fire to desks, chairs and bookcases.
The building did not have a sprinkler system and was not required to have one when built.
Six firefighters suffered minor injuries.
Principal Pat Griffin said the school's enrollment hit 1,952 on Friday and she expected to have 2,000 full-time students attending this year. ``But it doesn't look very promising right now,'' she said as she watched the school burn.
The portion of the building that burned had just undergone a substantial interior renovation that included new carpeting, walls and other improvements.
``It is beautiful,'' Griffin said, apparently unwilling to put the improvements in the past tense, even as a wide expanse of orange flames burst anew from the roof. ``I'm still taking it in,'' she conceded. ``It's devastating to me to see something like this happen.''
The loss of the library not only leaves the school without books, but also without the computers and other high-tech teaching and learning aids that were there, Griffin said. ``It's an extremely important part of the program,'' she said.
Firefighters who were in the library Friday said they doubted anything could be salvaged. They spotted mounds of burned books and melted computers.
Griffin was uncertain about what lay ahead. She said her school had plans for all sorts of emergencies, but most were geared toward getting students out of harm's way.
Allowing herself the luxury of a few hugs and kind words from staff and friends, Griffin mustered a smile and, as dawn broke, dived into the task of trying to put the pieces back together.
Griffin, members of her staff and city school administrators huddled for the first of many meetings to begin laying plans and seeking classroom alternatives to the gutted school. Superintendent James L. Pughsley, who had been out of town, rushed home to guide the efforts.
Even as school officials met, engineers - their arms packed with wrinkled blueprints of the school building - arrived to begin studying the structure and determine if it can be salvaged.
News from inside was not good. Eight-inch thick steel beams were twisted like pretzels; walls on both floors had to be shored up.
Describing it as a ``devastating fire,'' Anne Meek, assistant superintendent for organizational support, said officials must consider the needs of more than the school's 2,000 regular students. About 500 students in the city's Open Campus program are based at Princess Anne; 200 special education students also go there with 40 students in the Center for Pregnant Teens.
The school's faculty and staff met Friday afternoon at Green Run High School to begin planning how to teach without their school.
The school is insured by Aetna, Meek said, although it was unclear how much of a deductible must be borne by the city. Officials met with the school's insurance agent Friday afternoon.
The price tag for the fire was unknown Friday.
Prior to Friday's fire, the costliest school fire in the city's history was a 1993 blaze at Virginia Beach Middle School that caused more than $500,000 in damage. That fire was set by an arsonist.
As news of the fire spread, Catie Allard, an employee at the International House of Pancakes near the school, was paged by her manager to help serve sandwiches to firefighters. Allard, a 1994 Princess Anne graduate, then told her sister Leslie, a junior at the school.
Leslie Allard, a drummer in the school's band, paced back and forth on the sidewalk as she wondered about the fate of the school's band room and the newly purchased drums. She said she was shocked when she saw the damage.
``If it's burned our instruments,'' she said, pushing back her red hair, ``there's nothing we can do.''
Her fears were mirrored by band director Woody Gehlert, who heard about the fire from Allard's mother.
``They're pretty devastated,'' Gehlert said about his students.
One piece of the school was unscathed: A large mural, mounted in the building's facade by the Class of 1995. It shows a man riding a white stallion and is emblazoned with the words: ``The sky is the limit.'' MEMO: Related articles on pages A8 and A9.
Princess Anne High School students, faculty and staff can receive
updates on the situation from school officials by calling INFOLINE at
640-5555 and entering category 7247 (PAHS).
THE DAMAGE
Based on reports from firefighters who had been through the building,
school officials had a rough idea of how bad the damage was by midday:
Destroyed: The library, several library offices, 17 second-floor
classrooms serving the English and foreign language departments, the
foreign language office and two language laboratories.
Major smoke and water damage: The main office including the
principal's office, the guidance department, the bookkeeper's office,
the teachers lounge, cafeteria, four computer labs, six first-floor
classrooms serving business, marketing and social studies.
Substantial smoke damage: Thirteen classrooms serving the math,
foreign language and home economics departments, the mathematics
computer lab, four science labs, two foreign language labs, the student
government office.
ILLUSTRATION: Color photo by Motoya Nakamura, Staff
Battalion Chief Chase Sergeant said the smoke was so thick that
firefighters standing shoulder-to-shoulder could not see each other,
and had to feel their way around, using lockers as a guide.
Color photo by Martin Grube
More than 50 firefighters fought the blaze at Princess Anne High
School early Friday; six were slightly injured. Ten fire trucks,
backed by rescue squads and a hazardous-materials team, were on the
scene.
Color map by Ken Wright
Graphic by John Earle, Staff
Extensive damage
Photo by Bill Tiernan, Staff
An aerial view of Princess Anne High School, where an overnight fire
caused heavy damage to the Virginia beach school.
KEYWORDS: FIRE PRINCESS ANNE HIGH SCHOOL by CNB