DUBLIN FIRE BRIGADE needed five units to bring a blaze at a school under control – just two days before students were due to sit their first exams in the Junior and Leaving Certificate there.
A prefab building was set on fire at Castleknock Community College near Blanchardstown at about 3am on Monday morning.
Local independent councillor David McGuinness condemned the fire as an “absolute disgrace”.
“The responsibility probably lies with people who know the school very well,” McGuinness told TheJournal.ie.
A lot of people are really disgusted by what they saw. That school has served the community really well ever since it was formed.
School principal John Cronin told TheJournal.ie that he suspected the fire was started deliberately as there was no electricity running in the building at the time, which was vacant and had been marked for demolition and replacement.
“In my 20 years here with the school, this is the first incident of this type I have seen,” he said.
Apart from a few cracked windows there’s no real harm done, but the fire did come too close to local houses for comfort.
Prior to the fire being set, anti-social behaviour in the vicinity of the prefabs was reported by local residents to gardaí. However, they were told that there was no patrol car currently available according to McGuinness.
A Garda spokesman declined to comment when asked about the availability of a squad car in Blanchardstown in the lead-up to the incident.
“This is the second fire of this nature we’ve had in Dublin 15 recently, we had a playground set alight in similar circumstances quite recently,” said McGuinness.
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