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Pupils drink lab chemical
Friday 13th November 2009, 11:30AM GMT.
Six school pupils drank ethanol they had taken from the science lab of their West Midlands school while apparently mimicking a storyline from a BBC drama.
The teenagers were rushed to hospital after drinking the pure alcohol they took during a lesson at Aldridge School, allegedly copying a storyline from Waterloo Road.
The five girls and a boy, aged 14 and 15, were today said to have escaped any lasting health problems.
Education bosses in Walsall today said the BBC had “taken a risk” with the TV ethanol plot.
Councillor Rachel Walker, portfolio holder of children’s services for Walsall Council said: “It’s unfortunate that the young people had access to the chemicals involved and did not take on board the further content of the programme. The BBC has taken a risk with their programming as they do with lots of their gritty storylines.”
Warnings are now being sent out to other borough schools about securing chemicals following the drama, at 2pm yesterday.
Wednesday’s episode of Waterloo Road showed characters making ethanol cocktails. But it also featured a nurse repeatedly telling the pupils they could die from drinking ethanol. A BBC spokesman today said the show had tackled the issue in a “responsible manner”. He said: “The episode clearly showed the dangers of using ethanol and did not glamourise it in any way.”
The pupils from the Tynings Lane school were taken to Walsall Manor Hospital but were allowed to leave with their parents yesterday evening.
A letter to parents from school head teacher David Mountney today said a probe had been launched. “There are no concerns about their health and well-being and all of them are fully engaged in their GCSE exams at school today, as normal,” he added.
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I am a pupil at school and i can safley say that this incident was nothing to do with the members of staff here. The pupils who drank the ethanol are in my year and are just attention seeking chavs!! They thought it looked “cool” but they are meerly thought of here as IDIOTS!!!
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I go to Aldridge school, and i know it was not the programs or the schools fault. these 6 people were stupid enough to drink it because they wanted to get drunk. The pupils who drank it were in my year, and wanted to be ‘cool’ by drinking the Ethanol, attention seeking chavs ¬¬ .
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idiots.
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Im also a pupil at aldidge school, and in the same year as the pupils who drank the ethanol. I can saftley tell you that this was no fault of the teachers or the school itself, as they were in a science lab, ethanol is going to be in the vacinity. It is their own fault for drinking the substance, and personally, my view and a lot of others purly say it was thei fault, and that are just stupid immature little chavs.
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I just hope the program doesn’t show someone putting a loaded gun to their heads and pulling the trigger, there always has to be someone that can’t see the message that the program was sending out.
Waterloo Road is an excellent program and can clearly get over information to youngsters in a way they can understand, what a shame some kids are too stupid to understand the message it was giving that alcohol can kill.
Jim of Bearwood
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I think Abbie, Zoe, and Amy should “safely” make use of a dictionary!!!!
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Amy, zoe, abbie… Are you the same person?
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Maybe the pupils of this school should stop trying to get drunk and concentrate on learning how to spell judging by some of the comments!
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It just shows the governments stance on making it more and more difficult for teenagers to get their hands on alcohol and cigarettes just pushes them to the extremes of stealing or doing silly things like this.
Other country’s in Europe have a more relaxed attitude toward teenagers drinking and they don’t have any of the problems we have.
Banning something just makes it more desirable and more valuable.
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Jim, you can’t of seen the series opener a while back with the gun incident and yes you’ve guessed it holding it to a pupils head….It does however as you rightly stated give positive messages to kids.
Either way they are foolish and attention seeking and should be severely punished.
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i have watched every single episode of waterloo road and i love it, i would never even dream of copying any of the stunts on it cos anyone with half a brain will realise that its acting, they are just trying to show viewers the dangers of alcohol, if you are over the age of 1 you will know this already, i know my 4yr old son has more cop on than this lot, whats next banning all programs with any form of a sensitive storyline?? what use is that going to do, kids are going to do their own thing at the end of the day regardless and on this point i think for once we should stick up for the bbc or the whole country is going to turn into a bunch of idiots!
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Tim… The pupils who have commented on this are obviously against what the other children have done so I don’t think that their spelling has anything to do with their concentration on drinking do you??? Maybe you should concentrate more on your reading…However I think we all share the same view that the pupils who drank the chemicals are the only ones to blame not the BBC or the staff at the school! It’s their own stupid faults and they need to grow up fast, someone could have been seriously injured.
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I saw the programme in question. The character nearly died so if these idiots did not take that on board they obviously are of very low intelligence. If not I hope the school,parents,police and doctors really tore a strip off them for wasting everybody’s time and resources…perhaps a donation towards charity would be in order!
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Anyone with a noggin of sense *KNOWS* not to drink absolute ethanol.
It must be mixed 30:70 with water, add 2 drops of methyl formate to produce a passible white rum…
Informed of this by our college lecturer back in the early 70′s… and rather good it was too! :)
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How can Education bosses try to lay the blame with the BBC saying they have taken a risk, aint these pupils old enough to know right from wrong? This is now going to cost the local authority how much to investigate?
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how stupid
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Stupid Children.
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there just playing stupid fool
and there immature manner was to blame
no one else or any program them.
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I dnt go to Aldridge school but my sister does and she is in yr 7 this is not to blame on school or the staff.
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These children must be stupid if they have to copy what was happening on a bbc tv program, the blame is not with the bbc it is with the school and the pupils that drank the chemicle
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The frightening thing about all this is the level of intelligence. These same pupils are the ones my generation are relying upon to pay our pension, look after us in hospital or care homes. Judging by the standard of grammar and general education, can you be certain your medication issued by these dimwits will be 1mg, 10mg or 100mg? God help us in old age!!
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