Back to school fears: Danger in the dining area as beam collapses at Falkirk area primary school

In a message to parents, Kinnaird Primary School head teacher Ghislaine Tait stated: “An external timber beam adjacent to the dining hall was found to have dislodged

over the weekend. Our engineering design team inspected the school on Monday and have recommended these timber beams are removed/replaced.

“Until this work can be undertaken the internal and external spaces affected have been made safe and the entire area has been cordoned off as a precautionary

measure."

Mrs Tait went on to say the school would be open today and she looked forward to welcoming pupils back to the McIntyre Avenue, Larbert school.

However, a concerned parent said: “In a nutshell, they’ve got lucky in that when a big bit of the school fell off there wasn’t a kid beneath it. Yet no matter how hard I try to explain to them – that if one beam has fallen then another could – the penny doesn’t seem to be dropping.

“What formal, written assurances has the council, as the owner/occupier of the building, an employer, and educational authority with responsibility for the safety of

over 1000 children, been given by a structural engineer that there are no other parts of the site/building that may fail in a similar manner to the large, broken beam that

is currently lying on the ground beneath an access route and would probably have killed a child had it landed on them.”

In a statement which almost exactly echoed Mrs Tait’s, a Falkirk Council spokesperson said: “An external timber beam next to the dining hall at Kinnaird PS was found to have

dislodged over the weekend. Our engineering Design team inspected the school on Monday and has recommended that these timber beams are removed/replaced.

“Until this work can be carried out the internal and external spaces affected have been made safe and the entire area has been cordoned off as a precautionary measure.

“We would like to reassure parents that this only affects a small area of the dining room and the school will reopen as planned on Wednesday.”