Sewage traps Sutton students in school

The grounds of a Dublin secondary school were flooded with raw sewage yesterday when a pipe leading to a €400 million treatment system, officially opened by the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern this week, began leaking large volumes of effluent.

Hundreds of students at St Fintan's High School in Sutton, Co Dublin, were confined to their classrooms in the afternoon, as up to one foot of sewage accumulated outside the school buildings.

The school's principal, Mr Dick Fogarty, said the flooding had been "disastrous" and that its new astroturf playing pitch, installed at a cost of €100,000, may have to be relaid.

The fire brigade, gardaí and environmental health officers were called to the school which will be closed until Monday for health and safety reasons.

"Students were trapped in the building and they began to panic a little," Mr Fogarty said. "When we notified the council, the pumps were switched off and, after about an hour, we were able to evacuate the pupils."

The sewage leak is highly embarrassing for Dublin City Council which was responsible for the section of the pipe.

The station receives wastewater from Finglas, Ballymun, Baldoyle and Sutton via a 27 km sewer formally opened last Monday by the Taoiseach, the Lord Mayor, Mr Royston Brady, and officials from Dublin City Council and Fingal County Council.

A local authority spokewoman said the pipe began to leak when a pressurised manhole cover blew off one of the sewage pipes leading to the pumping station.

Just last month, Dublin City Council had to apologise to residents in the Ringsend and Sandymount areas of the city when its newly opened treatment plant caused a major odour problem.

The full extent of the damage at St Fintan's has yet to be evaluated, but local authorities said yesterday they would work hard to try to ensure the school grounds would be open early next week.

Environmental health officers and local authority officials were last night spraying and hosing down the school grounds with disinfectant. The school's 560 pupils, who play hurling, football and soccer, are likely to be without their other playing pitches for several weeks as the soil is tested by health officials.