School prefab’s roof blown 50m away

The overnight storm helped to underline a 500-pupil school’s case for a permanent building to replace prefabs.

The roof was blown off one of eight prefab classrooms at the CBS Primary School, Clounalour, Tralee, which the school board of management had been seeking to have replaced.

The roof was carried about 50m across the school grounds, smashed into trees and broke into pieces, some of which were blown across the road into a housing estate.

Cracks appeared on the ceiling of a second classroom and the roof was lifted slightly.

There have been ongoing negotiations with the Department of Education and school principal Denis Coleman yesterday said the school hoped to have a permanent structure in the near future.

“Fortunately, nobody was in the building at the time and nobody was injured. The builders will now be coming in and the building will be checked to ensure it’s safe before the school reopens after the holidays,” he said.

People woke up to discover extensive damage across Kerry and there were numerous reports of roofs being blown off farm buildings.

At one stage yesterday morning around 13,000 ESB customers were without power, but it had been restored to most by last evening.

By lunch time most roads, including the Molls Gap road between Killarney and Kenmare, the Killarney to Killorglin road and the Abbeydorney to Tralee, were fully open.

“The intensity of the storm and the fact that it lasted so long made it extremely frightening for people. It was one of the worst storms we’ve had in years,’’ said county council spokesman Padraig Corkery.

While council staff did “trojan work’’, he also paid tribute to people in local communities who went out with chainsaws and removed fallen trees without having recourse to the council.

The regular 7.30am flight from Kerry Airport to Dublin was cancelled.