No fewer than 80 students have been displaced from their boarding house accommodation at the Don Bosco Secondary School and Youth Centre, Obolo Obosi, near the commercial city of Onitsha, following a fire incident.

While taking journalists round the burnt hostel block on Sunday, the Co-ordinator of the school, Rev. Fr. Charles Uzoeto, said the fire broke out while the students and teachers were in school.

He disclosed that the students have been sent back to their parents following an agreement between the management of the school and parents as there was no place for them to stay.

According to Uzoeto, the property of the students could have been saved if the fire service team arrived in time but due to bad access road, they were unable to reach the school in good time.

In his words, “It was a serious fire incident. Nobody can say exactly what happened or how it happened because everyone was in school. We can only speculate about the real cause, but we thank God that no life was lost.

“About 80 students are housed in the two wings of the hostel and we cannot at this moment quantify the extent of damage as virtually everything the students had in the hostel was lost”.

Fr. Uzoeto noted that the entire beds, roof of the building as well as the structure of the building were destroyed by the fire.

“The fire service team after meandering through the markets with all the difficulties to arrive here, we were already counting our losses. I think if the roads were good, they would have reached here much earlier. They made efforts as human beings but they could not jump, they could not fly, and that reduced the chances of rescue,” he said.

The Co-ordinator appealed to the State Government, corporate organisations and kind-hearted individuals to come to the aid of the school to enable it commence its normal academic activities adding that mission school was built with the best intention, but with the fire incident, resources are not there like before.

News Express reports that the school is one of the three in Nigeria managed by the Salesian Priests of the Catholic Church.

•Photo by Pamela Eboh shows Co-ordinator of Don Bosco Secondary School, Obosi, Rev. Fr. Charles Uzoeto, pointing to the ruins of the burnt hostel . . . yesterday.