The lessons we can learn from the West disaster and how much it resembles Allen ISD

It’s been awhile since I last wrote. At the moment I am at the TASB Leadership conference. A few really good sessions. Always good to get a few other perspective of things, but the one that struck me the most was the session on the West School District disaster.

I have asked for Dr Hindt to connect with Dr Marty Crawford, who is the current Superintendent and was the Superintendent during the disaster. I spoke with Dr Crawford about the disaster and wanted his view on our setup for the new Transportation Facility. Seeing first hand the affects of the blast on the school district needs to be heard in our district. The proximity of the blast to their school facilities and neighborhoods is the same setup we have with our new Transportation Facility. One of the striking topics was the “canon balls” that penetrated the roof lines of the houses within the area. “Canon balls” are the projectiles that get blasted into the surrounding areas, i.e. dirt, clay, rock, steel and chemicals. Plus, the affect of the blast and how it reverberated within the confined spaces of homes, the schools and open air obstacles should be of great interest to this school district.

Most people don’t realize that their was actually 250 Metric tons Nitrate at that facility but only 25,000 pounds of it exploded resulting in the devastation that was experienced. This makeup eerily resembles the 25,000 pounds of high-pressure gas, diesel, gas and oil being stored in the above ground location of our new bussing facility. By having the above ground storage encased within a berm structure only adds more “canon balls” to the equation if a blast were to occur.  The fact is that the facility in West was also built to code and to standards that the city thought were sufficient for any such disaster, unfortunately, we as humans all too often fall into this circle of comfort in how much hardening we build into a structure, but the fact is we just need to re-look at where we are putting it. The City and the School District should reconsider the impacts of the above ground fuel storage, and either place into underground, or move it to the City facilities where the Police store their fuel (across the street from the Allen Bowl).

I’m hoping that Dr Hindt, our new Superintendent, will heed my suggestion and have the Superintendent of West come and speak with our Board.

Dr. Michael Myers
Trustee
Allen ISD

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