A WHOLE community has rallied round and pledged support after a devastating fire swept through and destroyed an infant school and nursery.

The blaze entirely gutted Thornwell's wood and brick-built 'Monmouth Method' infants school and nursery in the early hours of last Friday morning (June 3).

But despite the destruction, the school head is confident they'll be up and running first thing next week.

"What's happened is really sad," said headteacher, Linda Davies, after 12 hours on the scene. "But importantly, nobody was hurt, nobody was killed. What we need to do now is make sure the school family is kept together. It is vital we keep the school family together."

Linda, who was on the scene at about 2.30am said: "The caretaker was alerted at about 1am, or just after. He thought it was an intruder but as he came to the building he could see the flames."

At one stage, with fire officers from Chepstow and Avon and Somerset tackling the blaze, it was feared burning embers would spread to the adjoining junior school. Fortunately it was kept under control although the remains of the infant school were still smouldering 12 hours after the fire started.

Forensics teams were not able to start work on establishing the cause of the fire until the weekend and a report is not expected for weeks.

"It's quite tragic," says Mrs Davies, who has been head at the school for seven years.

"Everything has gone, all the furniture, desks, chairs, all the photographs, CDs and videos. All those memories gone forever.

"But this isn't going to beat us. We've had a terrific response from the fire brigade, from our local authority who've given us their complete support.

"Neighbours and loads of current and former pupils have been by to see if we need any help and wish us well. Thornwell Rugby Club have offered to send up the whole team of strong lads to help us with anything we need to do. The response from Thornwell has been absolutely fantastic."

The infants and nursery school buildings will be demolished this week and four temporary buildings brought in by Monmouthshire County Council.

Mrs Davies says the infant school and nursery will then re-open for business this coming Monday (June 13).