New school year gets off to unusual start, as fire alarm sounds at Bellingham school
The first day of the new school year at Bellingham’s Fairhaven Middle School got off to an unusual start, as a fire alarm sounded shortly after 10:30 a.m. Tuesday, Aug. 30.
The school was evacuated due to the alarm in the school’s gym building, which was determined to have been caused by a faulty smoke detector, Bellingham Public School spokesperson Dana Smith told The Bellingham Herald in an email.
The Bellingham Fire Department was called to the school at 10:37 a.m., according to the PulsePoint app. Smith said that always must be done before students are permitted to return to class, and it was the firefighters who determined the faulty detector was the cause.
“Everyone was safe, and students returned to class at around 11:10,” Smith wrote, adding that it was a “pretty routine safety situation.”
A work crew was on the roof at the time in a different part of the school, Smith reported, but it is not believed their work was connected to Tuesday’s alarm.
