Two Oklahoma schools destroyed by the devastating May 20 tornado lacked “safe room” shelters that cost up to $1 million, but could have potentially saved the lives of children who died in the wreckage.
Two elementary schools were destroyed in the EF-5 twister that
killed at least 24 people on Monday and injured
hundreds of others. Seven children were found dead in the debris of
the Plaza Towers Elementary School in Moore, Okla.
Authorities believe that everyone who was at Briarwood
Elementary School survived the deadly tornado, which ravaged the
building with 200 mph winds.
“You could just feel the pressure just building like you were
in an airplane, just the pressurization of the cabin and your ears
popping and the debris starts flying and the roof falling in,”
Briarwood’s first-grade teacher Sheri Bittle told ABC. “And
everything in your classroom falling in on you.”
Both of the destroyed schools lacked tornado shelters, which
would have potentially prevented many of the casualties and
fatalities that occurred on May 20. More than 100 Oklahoma schools
currently have metal safe rooms, which can be built above ground or
underground and sustain winds up to 250 mph.
These rooms may be the difference between life and death in
states where the tornado risk is high, but lack of funding to build
them has prevented elementary schools like Plaza Towers and
Briarwood from constructing shelters of their own.
Retrofitting a school with a safe room shelter costs an
estimated $600,000 to $1 million per building, Bloomberg News
reports. Albert Ashwood, director of the Oklahoma Department of
Emergency, told the news agency that his department can’t afford to
provide every school with a shelter, but that he is looking into
whether the two schools had ever even applied for federal funding
to build safe rooms.
“You have a limited amount of funds,” he said. “You
set priorities. It’s not a matter of they were being left
out.”
But Oklahoma residents refer to Moore as “Tornado Alley”, since
the area has been struck by devastating twisters more than any
other region in the US. In May 1999, a tornado took a similar path,
ravaging Moore, killing 41 people, and costing the US $1 billion in
damages.
Some residents believe that safe rooms should be a priority in
Oklahoma — particularly in Moore, since it has a history of falling
victim to tornadoes.
“If they can afford a $5 million football stadium, they can
afford a safe room,” 67-year-old John Lemmon, a Moore resident
who lives near Plaza Towers Elementary School, told Bloomberg.
“They should have done it right after they had the last big
one.”
While both elementary schools were reduced to rubble, students
at Plaza Towers Elementary School were worse off. This traditional
school building was constructed with a long line of classrooms that
were all under a single roof. When the tornado caused the building
to crumble, students were trapped in the wreckage of the structure,
and at least seven of them died.
Briarwood Elementary School was divided into four sections, with
several classrooms in each pod. Between these pods were openings
that led students outside, which allowed students to escape the
collapsing walls and ceilings.
No children died at Briarwood as they escaped the falling debris
with backpacks over their heads. But both schools could have
ensured the safety of their students if they had metal safe rooms
to retreat into during natural disasters.
Now that children have died in the May 20 twister that ravaged
Moore, Okla., the Federal Emergency Management Agency may
reconsider providing the funding for safe rooms. The city of Moore
has long been trying to acquire funds to buy them, and the city in
February wrote on its website that FEMA requirements have held them
back.
“If you don’t have disasters, you don’t have additional money
for mitigation for safe rooms, but without disasters there’s not a
set funding source just for safe rooms,” FEMA director Craig
Fugate told ABC, indicating that changes may only occur when it’s
too late to reverse the damage.
This article originally appeared on : RT