Classes canceled at Greenland High School after storm damage

Elementary, middle school classes still on

Damage at Greenland High School
Damage at Greenland High School

Classes at Greenland High School were canceled Wednesday after a storm blew off part of the school cafeteria roof early that morning.

“It was an event, but it could have been a whole lot worse,” Mayor Bill Groom said. “The best thing about it is no one was hurt.”

Winds ripped back about a third of the cafeteria roof, pulling out pipes, blowing away a skylight and creating several holes through which rain water leaked into the cafeteria and covered around 90 percent of the cafeteria floor, Superintendent Larry Ben said.

The storm struck at around 1 a.m., Groom said.

“My police chief came to open up the storm cellar at the middle school because we were getting tornado warnings, and he noticed that roof over there not being right,” Groom said of the cafeteria roof.

Police Chief Gary Ricker helped six people get into the cellar, which is used as a safe room, Ben said.

Greenland officials inspected the school and found the cafeteria covered in water after the storm passed.

Classes will resume Thursday, but the cafeteria will be closed. The school kitchen was unaffected by the storm and will be open to prepare food for the approximately 270 students. School officials will designate where students can eat until the cafeteria is repaired.

An insurance adjuster arrived Wednesday afternoon to meet with Ben.

“There is going to be major repairs needed for the roof,” Ben said.

Various parts of the high school have received roof improvements, but the cafeteria had not, Groom said.

“The irony is the school was thinking of repairing that roof anyway,” Groom said. “We knew there was a problem and now we have to fix it.”

The part of the cafeteria that was affected will be repaired and upgraded with new materials, Groom said.

“We may just replace that whole roof,” he said. “It depends on what the insurance guy says.”

Classes were not canceled for Greenland middle and elementary school students on Wednesday. Some middle school students helped remove fallen limbs and branches from school property in the mornings, Ben said.

The storm broke a tree in half and toppled a light pole, both located outside the School District building what building are we talking about?, which shares a campus with the high school, middle school and elementary school.

The school’s electricity was turned off for 30 minutes to an hour after it was found that some broken roof material had become lodged against power lines. Power was returned after the debris was cleared, Ben said.

Some storm debris struck the middle school roof causing a dent, Ben said.

“There were limbs laying on our campus that weren’t from our trees,” Ben said. “I don’t know where they came from.”

The storms hit private property in Greenland as well, causing tree damage to houses and vehicles. A “fairly sized” tree was brought down onto the hood of a pickup, Groom said.

Approximately 60 to 70 mph winds blew through the area a little before 1 a.m., said Pete Snyder, meteorologist with the National Weather Service’s Tulsa office.

“Whether it was a tornado or straight-line winds we don’t know,” Snyder said. “Someone’s going to have to go out and survey (the damage).”

The winds were strong enough to prompt a tornado warning that was issued at 12:41 a.m. for central Washington County. Another tornado warning was issued at 1:12 a.m. for the northeastern part of the county after the strongest winds blew through, Snyder said.

The nearest indication of a tornado was one that appeared on radar two miles northwest of Charleston in Franklin County, Snyder said.

Major damage in Washington County didn’t seem to extend beyond Greenland High School, said John Luther, director of Washington County Emergency Management.

“But that’s not to say there hasn’t been any power lines or trees affected,” Luther said.

It is too early to say whether hazardous weather, such as tornadoes or hail, will hit the area this weekend, Snyder said.

“The more severe weather will more likely be south of the Fayetteville area,” he said. “Of course, there’s a chance it can change. We’re fairly confident we’ll see showers and thunderstorms, especially Friday night and Saturday.”

Northwest Arkansas will probably see a break in the storms around noon Saturday, Snyder said.

Little damage was reported in Benton County from the storm.

Mike Dixon, the county’s emergency management director, said most reports received by the county concerned downed trees and tree limbs and power outages.

“The big thing is there were no injuries. We had a few trees down on houses and about 4,000 homes were without power at one point,” Dixon said.

Bill Edwards, mayor of Centerton, said Wednesday morning his city experienced mostly straight-line winds that knocked down trees and blew away playground equipment at one city park.

“About three-fourths of our residents were without power at some time during the night,” Edwards said.

Upcoming Events