WLBT 3 - Jackson, MS: House Explosion Forces Brandon Elementary Evacuation

House Explosion Forces Brandon Elementary Evacuation

By Roslyn Anderson
roslyn@wlbt.net

The West Jasper Street house explosion sent shock waves through nearby Brandon Elementary School and Brandon High School.

No one was injured, but elementary students were evacuated to the high school as a safety precaution.

About 100 yards away from the earth shaking explosion 1,100 Brandon Elementary students were in the process of evacuating.

School officials were warned of the accident and the gas line break and were moving children closest to the explosion to safer parts of the building.

Eight year old Duston Manning is a third grader at the school.

His mother Latonya Fletcher drove to the high school to find Duston, his sister Alexis and friends after the students evacuated.

Duston said, "When we were waiting there was a big explosion and the whole class had shook. So we all had to run out and come up here so we'll be safe."

The students were then moved to the safety of nearby Brandon High School, where parents soon began arriving to pick them up.

The explosion occurred around 1:15 p.m., shortly before dismissal.

Despite the chaos elementary principal Dr. Sue Townsend said students and faculty reacted calmly to the emergency.

Dr. Townsend said, "We were getting ready when we heard an explosion, and it shook our building pretty bad. It just shook us and scared us."

The blast erupted during third block at the high school.

Many students were unaware of what was going on.

Freshman Brittany Bailey was in Learning Strategies class when the blast occurred.

She said, "We were in the Steven's building, and we felt a big force hit the wall, and it shook the wall and we had to get down on the floor."

Sophomore Will King and classmates were startled by the loud noise.

He said, "We were in the classroom, and we heard this big old boom. Glasses were shaking and stuff. We thought it was a gunshot, so they just held us in class."

By 3:30 p.m. most elementary students were home, with the exception of students in the Frontiers after school program.

Bus riders went home as usual.

Some high school students were delayed because their buses were used to take the elementary students home.

Frontier students remained in the Brandon high school cafeteria.

The after school program ended at 6:00 and parents were able to pick up those children at the  Frontiers Building on College Street.