The Government revealed this Friday, March 27, in Leiria, that the reconstruction of schools will be based on a common construction model, based on the example of countries exposed to winds of 200 kilometers, guaranteeing their resistance.
The Minister of Education, Science and Innovation said that it is being considered, with public construction, “construction models, from countries that have already been exposed to these events [tempestades] for a long time, and we have structures that can withstand winds of 200 kilometers per hour”.
Fernando Alexandre, who was speaking at a conference organized by the newspaper Região de Leiria on “The post-calamity future”, added that the objective is to ensure that, “if there is a storm of this type, a school should not be inoperative again, because it cannot withstand these winds”.
The governor admitted that this resistance could have already been thought of, but highlighted that “after this event there is no excuse if we have a school in this region that was renovated during this period and the roof blows off again”.
The Government has been in talks, above all, with the presidents of the Chambers of Leiria and Marinha Grande – municipalities whose schools were most affected by Storm Kristin – to redesign existing projects, such as the José Loureiro Botas Secondary School, in Vieira de Leiria, in the municipality of Marinha Grande.
“We had this investment planned, the city hall already had a project and it was ready to go to public competition. But I have already spoken to the two presidents”said Fernando Alexandre.
As explained by the minister, the first notice of the loan from the European Investment Bank [BEI] It has now ended for priority one schools (P1), but schools will be able to make adjustments to projects for “structures that become more resilient”.
“Tender two, which ended in June, we are discussing with Coesão a proposal to have several phases” e “schools proposed by city halls, where P2s were planned, could change the proposals they had and introduce criteria for increasing the resilience of the network and allowing this dimension of strengthening resilience to be very present”he added.
Fernando Alexandre further observed that “school infrastructures, if well built, can be places of shelter for the population”, “they are not just a guarantee that learning is not interrupted”.
For the governor, schools must “being resilient to storms, but also to earthquakes and fires”.
The minister also added that “Portugal has planned, by the end of the decade, an intervention of more than 1,550 million euros in almost 400 schools across the country”alluding to the 174 schools recovered by Parque Escolar.
At least 19 people have died in Portugal since January 28 following the passage of depressions Kristin, Leonardo and Marta, which also left several hundred injured, homeless and displaced. More than half of the deaths were recorded in recovery work.
The storms, which hit the mainland for around three weeks, caused the total or partial destruction of thousands of homes, businesses and equipment, the fall of trees and structures, the cutting of energy, water and communications, floods and floods, with losses worth billions of euros.
The Centro, Lisbon and Vale do Tejo and Alentejo regions were the most affected.
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