POTEAU, Okla. — Crews are cleaning up after the Poteau High School agriculture education building caught fire around 3 a.m. Tuesday (Feb. 9) morning.
“It’s devastating. We’ve worked really hard to take care of and build it up,” said Poteau High School junior Ashlyn Barnes.
Barnes is one of the around 110 Agri students that was saddened to hear what happened.
“It’s definitely really hard to see like all the hard work we’ve put into cleaning the shop and organizing stuff and just getting things back in order and now we’re just going to start from new,” she said.
Poteau firefighters were able to put out the flames and no one was injured. Everything inside the building is a total loss.
Baby chicks, a worm farm, soil samples, welding equipment, a smoker and textbooks were all lost in the fire.
Poteau High School fire
“Our FFA program and our ag program is not just the building, it’s not just a classroom, it’s the students and what Ms. Shipman has put into it and everything,” she said.
The fire marshal is still investigating but says the cause of the fire was likely electrical.
School District Director of Operations Todd Hackler says they are thankful no students or teachers were inside the building at the time of the fire.
“We have a lot of kids involved in the program and it’s growing each year, and it’s just going to be a huge loss. Now we have to figure out where to go from here,” Hackler said.
The district is grateful that firefighters were able to contain the fire to the Agri building because the new high school building is not far from the ag building and was used for the first time just hours before the fire started.
“It’s kind of a weird transition. We’re happy, excited, all the kids excited about moving into a new building and then this happens,” he said.
The high school switched to virtual learning Tuesday due to the fire. Officials say the water wasn’t working on one of the buildings because of the fire, but the issue has since been resolved.
A GoFundMe page has been set up to help replace some of the items destroyed in the fire.