Saturday, May 3, 2008

Odor forces high school evacuation

Kenn Rodriguez News-Bulletin Staff Writer; krodriguez@news-bulletin.com

Los Lunas Students at Los Lunas High School got an unexpected day off from school when students and staff began smelling an odor of gas early Thursday morning. School officials were forced to evacuate the school, and ultimately sent students home for the day.

District Superintendent Walt Gibson said no students became ill, but a few initially reported being nauseated.

"The call came in around 9:30 a.m., and they said there was the smell of gas at the high school," Gibson said. "We had our maintenance staff up here immediately. It wasn't abating; it was clearly getting worse.

"We determined immediately that it wasn't on our campus, but that this 40-mile an hour wind from the west was bringing it from somewhere," Gibson said. "We were concerned about asthmatics and anyone else with respiratory problems. "

Initially students in the affected wings on the west end of the high school were evacuated to the cafeteria and gymnasium, which Gibson called "shielded, protected areas."

Gibson, who was in a principal's meeting at the time the first calls of the incident were made, arrived soon after the initial reports as did Los Lunas High School Principal Claudia Krause-Johnson. Soon after, they made the decision, along with the Los Lunas Fire Department, to evacuate students from the school.

Students and staff were then moved to the soccer fields at the north end of the school. Eventually the decision was made to send students home and the district's buses were brought in. Students who had their own vehicles, or walk to school, were allowed to leave on their own.

"We mobilized the security staff from all over the district, we brought in some extra nurses in case anybody got sick and we got our transportation director to pull in all the bus drivers," Gibson said. "It all went pretty smoothly."

It was about 10:30 a.m. when buses began leaving and the word was given that students should go home. Gibson said he got word that the source of the gas leak was a construction site across Interstate 25, west of the school.

He said district officials knew early on that the leak did not originate at Los Lunas High School.

"We determined, the maintenance department determined right away that there was no drop in gas pressure," he said. "The director of maintenance came here immediately, and they confirmed that it was not a problem in the school."

Students and staff returned Friday to school as usual, said Krause-Johnson Friday morning.

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