Students feel the freeze as Union County high school loses heat

INDIAN TRAIL, N.C. — Parents in Union County are demanding answers after their students arrived to school Tuesday morning and didn't have heat.

Staff at Sun Valley High School discovered the problem 30 minutes before the first bell.

Families were wondering why the district didn't issue a two-hour delay.

A spokeswoman for the school system said they checked the heat at all of the schools Monday and everything was working.

The buses were ready, and they decided there was no need for a delay.

They are still not sure what went wrong Tuesday morning, when the temperature was well below freezing.

“Like an iceberg," student Naiva Simpson said while describing the school day.

She wore a jacket and was wrapped in a blanket for most of the morning.

She said everyone was cold and complaining for the first two classes of the day.

“I don't think anyone could concentrate at all,” she said. “Everyone was distracting."

School officials said a little after 7:30 a.m. they realized the heat wasn't working.

They’re not sure what went wrong, but they fixed the problem in about 1 ½ hours.

Meanwhile, several other districts in the area were on a two-hour delay because of the cold.

"If we would have had that two-hour delay, everyone would have been fine," Simpson said.

Alyssa Swiatek said it would have made a difference for her because of what she saw on the roads as she drove to school.

"There was ice on the road, which was kind of scary," she said.

There was a thin patch of ice on the road and she thinks two more hours of sunlight would have melted it.

"I just don’t understand why," Swiatek said.

There were so many concerned students calling parents that school officials made an announcement asking them not to call home.

School officials posted on the school’s Facebook page thanking parents for calling with their concerns, and stated that the heat was working again.

School officials said they sent an email telling parents about the problem and will call parents Tuesday evening.

They will check the heat first thing Wednesday morning.

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