Major Blaze destroys building at high school in Lake Macquarie

Dozens of fire fighters have worked through the night to contain a major blaze at a school near Newcastle.

Transcript

00:01I'm on site here at Glendale Technology High in Lake Macquarie where an overnight fire has

00:07completely destroyed a building inside of the school. At around 1am, 50 firefighters responded

00:14to the blaze here on site. They arrived to find the building behind me completely engulfed in

00:20flames. Inside is a canteen, assembly hall and a basketball court. Fire and Rescue NSW has

00:27described some of the challenging conditions faced by firefighters. This is a very intense fire,

00:34extreme heat and smoke. Firefighters did an amazing job controlling the fire to the structure of origin.

00:40Now of course it is the first day of the school term here in New South Wales but luckily kids

00:46at

00:46Glendale weren't due to go back until Wednesday. We did see a number of teachers and staff arriving

00:52here on site this morning expecting to start their day as usual but the Department of Education

00:57has confirmed they've now been diverted off site. The cause of the fire is still unknown and subject

01:04of a joint investigation by police and specialist fire crews who are arriving on scene in the next

01:10few hours.