Stay Signed In
Do you want to access your site more quickly on this computer? Check this box, and your username and password will be remembered for two weeks. Click logout to turn this off.
Stay Safe
Do not check this box if you are using a public computer. You don't want anyone seeing your personal info or messing with your site.
‘How dare they’ - Harryville primary school principal Lesley Meikle
From Daily Ireland 12/10/05
Loyalists put kids in the line of fire ... again
‘How dare they’ - Harryville primary school principal Lesley Meikle
Connla Young
Schools under threat:
June 27
St Joseph’s Primary School, Ahoghill, targeted in paint attack.
August 16
St Joseph’s Primary School, Ahoghill, targeted in paint attack
August 30
petrol bomb attack at
St Mary’s Primary School, Harryville, Ballymena
August 31
petrol bomb attack at
St Louis’ Primary School, Ballymena
September 12
three pipe bombs found in hedge at Harryville Primary School, Ballymena
October 11
pipe bomb and components discovered at Harryville Primary School, Ballymena
“I would urge the people who have left these things here to come in and talk to me and tell me why they are putting the lives of my children at risk.”
- Lesley Meikle
Dozens of frantic parents rushed to rescue their children yesterday after workmen discovered a bomb in the grounds of a Co Antrim school.
More than 140 children, some as young as two-years-old, were evacuated from Harryville Primary School and an adjoining nursery in Ballymena, after a pipe bomb fell at the feet of a workman who was trimming a hedge in the school’s grounds.
A number of nearby houses were also evacuated during the alert.
The Protestant primary school was also forced to close on September 12 last after three pipe bombs were found stashed nearby.
It is suspected that the pipe bombs were hidden around the school until such time as they would be used by loyalist paramilitaries. It is not known if yesterday’s find formed part of the original haul of pipe bombs dumped close to the school.
In a follow-up search of the area, requested by Harryville Primary School principal Lesley Meikle, a bag containing pipe bomb component parts was discovered in the same hedge, just metres from the school building.
A British Army bomb squad was called to the scene to deal with the bomb find.
Mrs Meikle said the hedge used as a bomb store will now be ripped out.
“My only consolation in all this is that the school is not the target,” she said.
“They are using the school hedge as a hidey hole. I have made arrangements for the hedge to be removed and if the board doesn’t do it I will dig it out myself.
“This sort of thing distresses the children. The first time it happened we could pass it off and say the school was safe. This time we will be honest with them and show them that the hedge is being pulled out.
“I would urge the people who have left these things here to come in and talk to me and tell me why they are putting the lives of my children at risk.
“Harryville gets a bad press and now we are in the middle of it but a school should be an oasis of calm. Our thoughts go out to the man at whose foot this device fell at. He or his colleagues could have been seriously hurt or killed.”
The Harryville district of Ballymena has been in the headlines in recent years after loyalist protesters set up a blockade at the local Catholic church.
In August the district’s Catholic primary school, Saint Mary’s, was torched in a sectarian fire bomb attack. The principal of that school, Martin Kearney, visited Mrs Meikle yesterday to offer his support.
DUP Mayor of Ballymena, Tommy Nicholl, launched an angry attack on those responsible for leaving the potentially deadly device close to the school.
“I am totally disgusted by this,” he said.
“There is no place in society for people who would perpetrate such evil, especially when there’s a danger to young children. There is no excuse for this and I hope the police catch those people and put them away. The people of Ballymena and Harryville want nothing to do with this act, it gives them a bad name. Ninety eight per cent of the people in this area are law abiding and I would appeal for the people who did this to get off the backs of the people.”
Sinn Féin MLA for North Antrim Philip McGuigan condemned the attack.
“To leave these deadly devices in public is worrying, but I would have to ask what these people thought they were doing when leaving these things on the premises of a children’s school,” he said.
