Nov. 12 in Wiscasset Middle High School's library, Wiscasset's superintendent of schools thanked God "nobody blew up" in an incident one month earlier in a WMHS classroom.

Superintendent of Schools Kim Andersson named no names but gave an otherwise detailed description of an Oct. 10 propane emergency after Devin Grover, a lieutenant with Wiscasset Fire Department, brought it up in public comment.

Grover was on scene with the department that morning. In the Tuesday, Nov. 12 school committee meeting in the library and live on YouTube where Wiscasset Newspaper viewed it, Grover noted Andersson referred to the incident in her superintendent's report earlier in the meeting. He said there should be further discussion on what should happen in such an emergency. 

He said the incident was a propane leak. “You had a real life emergency … Propane is a huge deal. We deal with it a lot at the fire department.” He said given propane was involved, the evacuation, to the track and elsewhere, was not far enough.

“That is too close. You need to be evacuating the property. The kids need to be going away, if it’s just a smell, a leak, anything.”

To his knowledge, no one with the school department told responding fire department members the students were all out of the building and “the building is yours,” Grover said. “Nothing was communicated to any of us, to my knowledge.” That handoff of the building should be policy, including giving responders a list of students and faculty who had been in there, he said.

Grover said matches were in use in that classroom. "That is a big deal. Kids’ and (other) people’s lives were in danger at some point. Luckily nothing happened. We eliminated all of that (and) the building was turned back over, and everything was good. But I think that situation should be talked about a little bit more, and evacuation procedures should be discussed. Thank you.”

“Thank you very much,” Chair Jason Putnam said. Committee members then said they want to look at procedures and make sure those will address things Grover brought up, including notifying firefighters everyone is out of the building.

Andersson offered to recount the events. She told the meeting, the incident happened the morning of the surprise announcement and celebration for Wiscasset Elementary School's Becky Hallowell’s being named Maine Teacher of the Year. So Andersson, and WMHS Principal Sarah Hubert along  with some students, had been at WES, Andersson said.

At WMHS that morning, “a teacher arrived at 9 a.m. and turned on the gas. The class changes at 9:20, so students transferred in the hall and you could smell propane. So they immediately got a second teacher, who went into the classroom and saw that a propane jet was on. And she heard it. And she turned it off, and opened windows and called for help. At that point, at 9:20, the building should have been evacuated. The building was evacuated at 9:40. So another 20 minutes (had gone) by. The propane had been turned off. Matches had been lit. Thank God nobody blew up. It was terribly, terribly serious. And we’ve discussed it internally and had more discussion about evacuations … So yeah, you’re 100% right,” she told Grover.

"We are so lucky that we didn’t blow up this school that day, because that could have happened," Andersson said. "And it was a human error. As a result, the gas has been completely shut off and won’t be used at all. And there are other results that I’m not at liberty to explain in a public forum.”

She reiterated, the incident was “very significant. And it should not have been handled the way that it was. You’re right.”

Said committee member Victoria Hugo-Vidal, “Sounds like a lot of learning opportunities available.”

“We all remember Farmington,” Andersson added about the 2019 propane explosion that according to cdc.gov killed a fire captain and injured other firefighters at an office building in that Maine town. “I mean, we’re all just incredibly, extraordinarily lucky," Andersson continued about last month's incident. 

Committee members then firmed up plans to review procedures and to have the town's public safety chiefs and John Merry, the school department's maintenance and transportation director, be included.

Grover said the school committee and the town are very lucky to have Merry, an assistant fire chief, as an administrator in the school department.

Parents are always welcome at policy committee meetings, school committee member Jodi Hardwick added. The policy committee meets at Central Office at 5 p.m. the fourth Tuesday of the month, according to wiscassetschools.org

In her superintendent's report during the school committee meeting, prior to Grover's comments, Andersson said the classroom where the incident occurred was a chemistry classroom, and that now, instead of propane, electric hot plates are being used. "Thank God nothing happened, but ... there was an emergency, and people were calm and cool, maybe too calm, but left and got out of the building ..."

Wiscasset Newspaper on Wednesday morning, Nov. 13 asked Andersson via email a series of questions about the incident and its outcomes. Andersson said, due to state protections on personnel records, she could not answer some of the questions. Responding to other questions, she said: "Since the incident, administration has met and discussed how we could have handled that situation differently, including immediately evacuating the building at 9:20 a.m. Training around evacuations is ongoing."

In response to an email request for information Oct. 11, and as the newspaper subsequently reported, Andersson said at the time: "Students and staff noticed the smell of propane in a chemistry room ... where a bunsen burner was in use. The propane was shut off and out of an abundance of caution, the principal evacuated the building and had the fire department come to check the air quality. Students and staff did an excellent job evacuating the building safely and calmly. After approximately 50 minutes, students and staff were cleared to return to their regularly scheduled classes. Staff, administration, and emergency personnel will meet to review safety protocols in our ongoing effort to keep students and staff safe at all times."