Elliott Herlihy
A view of the fire department responding to the fire, taken from Marigold St.
On April 25th, two fires broke out at Pleasant Valley High School (PVHS). The first was reported at 4:29 p.m., and was originally contained by firefighters on the scene. The second fire, which caught in the same place as the first, broke out at 7:45 p.m., and a full response was issued by the fire department. The affected building was identified as the Arts Building, which houses the Ceramics, Digital Media, and Yearbook classrooms. It is located at the east end of campus near Marigold Street.
According to PVHS students Jayda Bumgarner (11) and Brooklyn Backus (11) who were at the scene, the first fire was contained, but then reignited. “We drove by after a baseball game, and it was all good; there weren’t really any flames, and I guess it sparked again… Hopefully it doesn’t spread any more, and we will be good by Monday.”
“For our ceramics and digital art classes, we’ve been put into the library.” Says PVHS junior Oliver Lois. “For the past couple of classes, digital art students have just been given free time while our teachers try to come up with new assignments. This is because we most likely won’t have access to our digital art supplies until next school year. Luckily, our teacher was able to save some computer towers, so it’s not like we’ve completely lost our files and past work. For studio art classes, they’re currently in our E building. The E building is right next to our (now defunct) art building, and is home to our welding class if I remember correctly.”
The cause of the fire is still under investigation.