Nepal earthquake

Friday 15 May 2015

The earthquake that struck Nepal on 25 April 2015 has brought widespread suffering and devastation to the country and surrounding areas. This earthquake has had far-reaching effects, and unfortunately its power reached our friends in India.

From left to right, Sister Andrea, a student from St Mary’s and John Casson.

St Mary’s School, Singla, near Darjeeling, is located in the Indian Himalayas and is part of the same mountain range that runs through neighbouring Nepal.

The earthquake’s epicentre was in Gorkha, 147 kilometres from Kathmandu, the capital of Nepal. The earthquake reached 7.8 on the Richter scale, and the resulting quakes in India were around 6.1.

The earthquake struck St Mary’s School at 11.40 am local time. Fortunately this was the weekend, and many of the students and teachers were at home, but there were still a number of students at the school who board during term time.

Sister Andrea, the senior Sister who runs the school, raised the alarm and shouted to the students to get out of the building as quickly as possible. As the students and Sisters stood outside in terror, they watched as the buildings swung from side to side. As you can imagine, the students and Sisters were terrified, and they clung to each other for comfort as the tremors continued for 40 seconds, resulting in all the power to the school being lost.

At around 12.30 pm the second tremor struck while the students were at lunch, and once again the school was evacuated. Fortunately this tremor only lasted for ten seconds, and afterwards the students very reluctantly re-entered the buildings once again. Another tremor, which was shorter and less violent than those earlier in the day, occurred at 10 p.m. That night the students put their mattresses on the floor and they all slept together.

On the following day, Sunday 26 April, another powerful earthquake struck the school. Having learned the routine, St Mary’s School was again quickly evacuated. For the following days, the school remained closed for reasons of safety. During this time, there were eight further aftershocks.

On first inspection, there appears to be no serious damage to the buildings at St Mary’s School, although there were some cracks to exterior walls. Further inspection will be required to confirm their severity.

All the students, teachers and Sisters in and around Singla are safe, along with trustee of the John Casson Foundation Allan Biswas, his wife Tenzin and family, who live in Siliguri, the main city below the Himalayan foothills, about three and a half hours away by road, which was also affected.

The foundation has organised emergency evacuation procedure drills for St Mary’s School, as further earthquakes in the area are anticipated.

This is being organised at the school by Allan and Tenzin’s security company, A1 Security. This company has considerable experience in emergency evacuation procedures, and its managers have attended St Mary’s School to provide this training without charge.

Read Sister Andrea’s full word-for-word account of what happened when the earthquake struck:

‘Dear Mr. John and all our dear friends,

Greetings from Sr. Andrea, all the sisters, students and teachers,

Here I, Sister. Andrea would like to share with you all our terrifying experience with the recent earthquakes.

On Saturday the 25th at 11.40 a.m. local time, we felt the first tremor of the earthquake. Feeling the tremor I screamed out to the hostel children to get out of the hostel as quickly as possible – some of them were washing their clothes, some were helping the cook, some were cleaning the hostel, some were at study. They rushed out crying – terrified – the tremor continued and in front of our eyes we saw the buildings swinging side to side – all the trees around us had a swinging motion. The children were terrified and called out: the school building is coming upon us. Their eyes showed the terror and fear. They clung to me – I could feel their heart beat – almost out of control. My own condition was not better either. But I encouraged the children to hold on – told them that nothing will happen to them. The terrifying thing was the tremor continued almost for 40 seconds. The electric power too was cut off immediately. It took some time for the children to come to normal. I thanked God that it was a Saturday and the school had a holiday. Otherwise I would never know how to control the students at such a terrifying moment. God really protects.

At around 12.30 p.m. the children came for their lunch. As they were collecting their lunch in their plates, the second tremor occurred. They screamed, threw their lunch plates, rushed out of the dining room. Although I was with them all the while, I could do nothing to quieten them. The little ones clung to me. This time the tremor was not very long, lasted about 10 seconds. It shook the whole building, along with all that was in it. It took a long time to persuade them to re-enter the dining room to collect their lunch and eat it. Thereafter they stayed outside all the time. It was peaceful until 10 p.m. At around 10 p.m. another tremor occurred. This time although they were terrified, they stayed together, without crying. No one slept on their own beds – all put their mattresses on the floor and slept together. It was not the end.

On Sunday afternoon, another powerful jolt occurred. By then we got used to the fear and the terror. Now we learned to get out as quickly as possible and to take shelter in the open space. Until up to now we had about 8 aftershocks. We closed the school on Monday. But there was more to come.

On Monday at 6.30 p.m. most unexpectedly another powerful shake with a screeching sound occurred. Once again we all rushed out, fear and terror was on everyone’s face. The sound was terrifying. The children were shivering from head to foot; they cried out loudly. They were inconsolable for some time. Some of the more terrified children wanted to go home, so we called the parents and sent them home in the night itself. The rest remained with us. We had the school closed on Tuesday too. Later through the TV channels we learned the last quake was very close to us – Mirik was the epicentre – that is about 40 km away from us. Today we learned that a lot of damage to the buildings in Mirik and the surrounding areas was caused by this one. I prayerfully hope that was the last one.

Now we get frightened whenever there is movement. We are inclined to think it is another quake.

Yesterday I went around the buildings to see if any serious damage is done by these shakes. We discovered a number of cracks on the walls of the new building. I hope they are not serious ones – looks like plaster cracks. Sometime later I will get an engineer to have it checked, to see whether it might cause any damage to the building. In the classrooms all the decorations made by the children came down. Most fell and broke (pots and plates that they’d painted). The things in the steel cupboards shook and tumbled down in the shelf itself. A few glass windows broke – but not so bad.

St. Teresa’s School – where our children go for 11 & 12 classes – is badly cracked. They have closed the school till next Wednesday. In Darjeeling a number of buildings suffered serious damages.

The Lord protected us and our children very miraculously. We are deeply grateful to all who are thinking of us and praying for us. In the name of St. Mary’s may I thank each one of you for your prayerful support at this time of our anxiety.’

The school is run by the Congregation of Jesus (CJ), an international order, headquartered in Rome, of some 2,000 Sisters who are present in 24 countries and has been sponsored by John and Jenny Casson and the John Casson Foundation since 2001.