Months after the Mahdia School dormitory fire claimed the lives of 20 children, teacher Amanda Peters-Nedd on Friday testified on the effects it continues to wage on her entire household.
Still reeling from the impact, the Commission of Inquiry (CoI) heard on Friday that her son – also a teacher at the school – lost eight students that night and subsequently suffered a complete shutdown.
Peters-Nedd moved with her entire family of five to Mahdia in 2022 to serve as Head of the English Language Department after it was found that there were no trained teachers in the region to reach the subject.
Her husband also took up the role of part-time dorm father and her 19-year-old son, Derick Nedd Jnr, served as a Mathematics teacher at Mahdia Secondary. The family resided in the teachers’ quarters, located a stone’s throw away from the school’s compound.
On the night of May 21 at about 23:15h, Peters-Nedd and her husband were in their quarters when they heard screams which at first, they thought were coming from a ‘scary movie’ from another section of the dwelling.
After the screams persisted, her husband decided to check and it was then they were both alerted of the horror that was unfolding – the Mahdia Secondary School girls’ dormitory was on fire. Rushing over to the scene, she assisted with providing clothing to the girls who escaped the burning building.
“I said it appears as if the people upstairs are watching a scary movie. The sounds were like that. [Her husband] said no, that it sounds like it’s coming from the female dorms and he ran outside the front door and saw the flames. He said the dorm was on fire and both of us ran in that direction…Some of the girls were black because of the smoke and some of them had no clothes…The place is usually very hot so most time the children don’t really sleep with much clothes on,” the educator shared.
The fire had consumed the front section of the building and sometime after, the Guyana Fire Service arrived on the scene, operating in what was described as a “disorganised” fashion.
“They were very much disorganised. For me, it was like they weren’t trained to attend to this quick response. That’s my personal view because I did not get the response that I expected them to,” the teacher added.
Impact
The woman told the CoI that her son was mostly affected by the tragedy. The 19-year-old Mathematics teacher is a first-year student of the Cyril Potter College of Education.
After the news broke that the devastating fire had claimed 20 lives, he had to be medevacked to the Georgetown Public Hospital where he was diagnosed with acute stress disorder.
Sobbing, the mother shared, “He had a complete body shutdown. They had to medevac him out of Mahdia to Georgetown where he spent an entire week in the hospital. He is currently still attending the psychiatric clinic at the Georgetown Hospital. He is still greatly affected by this incident. The doctor said he was diagnosed with acute stress disorder because not everybody is made to deal with a certain amount of stress and it was too much for him.”
While Peters-Nedd has not benefited from any psychological support, her husband is receiving such services. Her other two children – both minors – have also been affected. Since the tragedy, the family has moved back to their Tuschen, East Bank Essequibo home where she is employed as an acting Head Teacher of Uitvlugt Secondary School.
“Nobody has come to talk to me about the matter. My husband is affected. He sleeps sometimes two or three hours per night.”
She recalled receiving $50,000 per day from the Government when her son was hospitalised. However, at this time, she noted that no other financial support has been offered.
Unsafe
Meanwhile, the former Mahdia Secondary School teacher shared that she had raised concerns about the dorm mother living in a storage room, which housed old batteries.
“I indicated to her that the batteries would give off gas sometimes and it’s not safe for her kids and she needs to make sure that the Department of Education does something about it. I think when people from the Energy Agency came as well, they said the room is not safe for her and her kids.”
Steve Jerome, the primary dorm father, was responsible for this aspect of the dormitory and would have notified the Regional Department of this issue. (Rupa Seenaraine)
