Rathmore NS was first to get school shooting email in County Carlow 

ONE of the smallest schools in Co Carlow was the first to receive an email last Wednesday morning in which the sender threatened that there would be bloodshed in the school that day.

The email was sent to 20 schools across Co Carlow on Wednesday, causing massive fear and confusion among teachers, parents and the wider public.

Eithne Molloy, principal of Rathmore NS near Tullow, believes that she was the first person to receive the email. She told The Nationalist that the email was sent just after 7am and that, on seeing the contents, she immediately phoned the gardaí. Within minutes, gardaí from Tullow Garda Station arrived at the school because they needed to see the email for themselves in person.

Gardaí from Tullow and detectives from Carlow kept a running check on the school throughout the day on Wednesday and continued to make their presence seen during the following two days.

“The gardaí were exceptional – Garda Martha Hughes was excellent,” said Eithne. “It wasn’t up to the gardaí to tell us whether to open or not, that was up to our board of management and they decided that we should stay closed.” 

When she opened the email, she said that she “got a shock. My first concern was to keep everyone safe. We get a lot of ridiculous emails, but you’d never expect something like this”.

Within an hour of Eithne opening the threatening email, parents were notified that the school would stay closed that day.

She reckons that she was fortunate to have got the email early enough for a clear decision to be made and that there was no confusion or panic among the parents.

“They were very calm, to be honest, and very supportive. Some reached out to us to see if everything was OK. The parents were happy that we did the right thing. Some parents wanted assurance from the gardaí that it was safe, but how could they do that?” she continued.

She also said that there was very good attendance by the 41 pupils the following day and that none of the children mentioned the threat made.

“Not one child mentioned it on Thursday, so we’re very fortunate. We had decided that unless it was mentioned, it was business as usual for us all,” Eithne pointed out.

One of the biggest concerns of Co Carlow schools that were sent the threatening email was that there are no protocols or directions from the Department of Education when such situations occur. Several school principals have called on the department to issue immediate guidance on what management should do in the event of another similar incident.

“This was unprecedented – you’d never have expected this to happen in Ireland. We would have preferred if there was some direction from the Department of Education, but we’re very proud of our school and how we handled it,” said Eithne.