A Horrid Sight

[callmemadam]

A week ago I posted about our lovely Priest's House Museum. Then over the weekend, this happened,



right next door. Three old buildings gutted.



The view round the back



Quite a hole in The Square and you can still smell fire in the air. Horrible.

There's a video clip here.

Comments

[mimmimmim.livejournal.com]

Oh no! Can they be restored?

[callmemadam.livejournal.com]

That's the plan. It'll take a long time though, and meanwhile they have to find somewhere for the town's only post office! It was such a mistake to close the main one.

[dozydormouse.livejournal.com]

They'll probably put up a portacabin if they cannot find an empty shop. Royal Mail do this all the time. If the next PO is only 10 or so minutes by road they lay on a shuttle bus. I know this because of Papa's former post. I am after all the girl who when I answered the phone at 2am to be told by RM's central fault control "Borough PO is on fire" said "have you called the fire brigade and have the tenants been evacuated before waking my father." I used to be so well trained... In borough it was a 5 min drive to the next PO so they ran a bus back and forth all day. I imagine in yourt town it is rather further...

[callmemadam.livejournal.com]

I didn't know that. There are three post offices each about five minutes' drive away. The problem for those with ther own transport is parking at them. For pedestrians it's the inconvenience of depending on a bus. There's at least one empty property where they could set up a counter but there may be legal problems, I don't know. Thank goodness I now have a PO I can walk to!

[lurpak.livejournal.com]

how terrible... I wonder if they managed to salvage anything from the museum?

[callmemadam.livejournal.com]

Fear not! By a miracle, the museum was undamaged. It's the three buildings next door which have suffered. Ghastly.

[lurpak.livejournal.com]

oh I didn't read properly! I hope they can restore the other buildings one day.

[(Anonymous)]

There's nothing worse than beautiful old buildings being destroyed by fire - although thank goodness nobody was hurt, like in the recent fire in the tower block in London. Sad news.

[callmemadam.livejournal.com]

Yes, thank goodness they got everyone out safely.

[dozydormouse.livejournal.com]

It is so sad when soemthing historic and beautiful burns. I am glad they are going to restore it and that no one was hurt.

[gghost.livejournal.com]

Oh, such a dreadful loss! As others have said, I'm so glad that no one was injured and that buildings will be restored.

[callmemadam.livejournal.com]

Yes, relief all round that it's inconvenience and expense rather than tragedy.

[(Anonymous)]

Fire is such a scary thing. I'm sorry for your town losing such old beauty. Naturally I'm glad no one was hurt. The last time (1992) we were in England, we stayed in The Swan Hotel in Arundel, and later read it burned down. It gave me an odd, sad feeling that those halls we walked and the room we stayed in were gone. I've just done a search and found it exists, so whether I got it wrong or it has been rebuilt, I just don't know. I can't seem to find anything about a fire. Weird.

[callmemadam.livejournal.com]

I hope we shall see the buildings restored. It's tough on the businesses involved, hope their insurance was OK!

How very mysterious about The Swan. Arundel is in a nice part of the world, I know the area well.