Arson.

At mum's school there is quite a large garden area for the nursery with a lovely big climbing frame. It took years and years for the school to save up enough money, about ten grand, to be able to afford this climbing frame and the kids absolutely love it. It looks a bit like this but the legs aren't splayed because the area underneath is enclosed and one side has a sensory area in it with bark and things.

[Edit: Pic removed as link died.]

Last weekend some young lads (aged 11/12) got into the nursery garden and vandalised the climbing frame. They ripped off parts of the eaves and damaged some climbing poles. The police were called by neighbours but they didn't come and get rid of them or even get back to the people that called. Again this Saturday the same boys were back messing about in the nursery garden, smashing bottles and vandalising the climbing frame. The neighbours called the police again and still they didn't come out. Then on Bank Holiday Monday at about 5pm, one of them decided to set the climbing frame alight and it went up like a rocket. There were lots of witnesses and I know someone has a photo of it on fire. These are the pictures I took of it after the firemen had put it out and forensics were on the way. In some of them you can see how the trees around it have been scorched.





This one shows the leftovers of a crawl tunnel made out of heavy duty plastic in the shape of a caterpillar that was nearby, originally there were four sections to it.


This one shows how the heat affected the sign on the side of the school, it just melted away. You can't see it but the white bit next to the blue door is all bubbled up and if that had been melted away the fire would have got into the structure of the building and the whole nursery would have gone up.


Thankfully the staff and police know the lads that did this, at least two of them only left the school last September and mum taught both of them.