Eighth-Grader Attacks School; Students Return

At Krasnoyarsk School No. 153 (the Pokrovsky Complex), which was attacked the day before by an eighth-grade girl, classes resumed on 5 February. NGS24.RU correspondents examined the situation in the morning before classes began.

One of the students« mothers, who introduced herself as Ekaterina, said that her children went to school today despite yesterday»s incident.

“Well, what can you do? We still have to study,” she explained to the correspondent.

According to Ekaterina, by the morning of 5 February, teachers had not yet had time to talk to parents and children about what happened. She rates the security of the school in Pokrovsky as “adequate.”

“But they don’t have time, of course, to check the entire volume of children who pass through this detector in the morning or at lunch. They don’t check their bags to open and look inside,” added the mother.

Ekaterina believes the attack became possible because the school is “very severely” overcrowded (children study in two shifts; in 2023, the city administration recognized the Pokrovsky Complex as the most overcrowded school in Krasnoyarsk).

“Teachers have a thousand and one burdens,” she shares her observations. “And this school should have been relieved of its load a long time ago. If, God forbid, the same thing happens again… there will be a nightmare and another crush [problems could arise in that regard]… Although yesterday, as my son told me, the teacher got the kids out normally, she acted quickly when the evacuation was announced. And the school definitely needs to be relieved. That’s 100%.”

A tenth-grader, in turn, admitted in a conversation with a correspondent that, in his opinion, there are security problems at the school.

“I think our security is absurd,” he said. “Our guards are grandmas and grandpas. What can they do? Rosgvardia (the Russian National Guard) is not patrolling nearby.”

Another student said it was hard for her to find words about what happened:

“The students seem normal,” the senior student said. “The teachers keep order. But at the same time, you don’t know what’s going on in a person’s head. This can happen in any school.”

On the afternoon of Wednesday, 4 February, an eighth-grade girl from School No. 153 brought acetone and a hammer to school. She set fire to the restroom and the math classroom, where a lesson was underway. She struck students who were running out of the classroom with a hammer. As a result, five students and one teacher were injured: three children had burns, two girls had injuries. The girl’s motives remain unclear: information about whether she was bullied by classmates varies. The day before, investigators interrogated the girl.

On 5 February, classes were not canceled at the school, but the schedule was adjusted.

NGS24.RU journalists visited the scene the day before and spoke with students. Details can also be found in the online broadcast.