A HEAD teacher has described seeing his school's gym collapse after it was torched by arsonists.

Eddie Brady, head of Chester-le-Street's Hermitage School, says it will cost at least £1m to make good the damage done.

The blaze ripped through the school's gym, just of Waldridge Lane, in the early hours of Saturday, November 3.

The gym collapsed when the fire took hold, destroying almost all the school's sports equipment, including trampolines, gym equipment, football and hockey nets, as well as computers and administrative equipment.

A police investigation into the blaze has since been hampered by the need to wait until asbestos at the site had been completely removed.

Mr Brady, now preparing a National Lottery bid to help pay for a completely new gym, said the scene that confronted him was heart-breaking.

"I got a call at about ten past three in the morning saying the school was on fire. I got there about 20 minutes later and saw four or five fire engines and a police car.

"In the end it collapsed because of the fire. It was quite a scene. I was devastated."

The school is now without changing rooms or gym facilities and the Sports Hall has suffered from water damage and possible structural damage.

Over the last five years, millions of pounds have been pumped into the school, making it one of the county's biggest turnaround success stories.

But school bosses now have to count the huge cost of a night of vandalism on a mass scale. Mr Brady added: "This is a really big blip for us on an otherwise upwards slope.

"We are looking at a year before we'll be able to have any kind of gym facility open for the students and the community again.

"The staff have been brilliant though, and have helped to adapt a couple of the classrooms and the assembly hall into temporary changing rooms and a sports area.

"We are trying to see this positively, but it really does undo some of the brilliant work we have done."

Two 16-year-old boys appeared before magistrates in Peterlee yesterday, one charged with arson and the other with arson and burglary. Two other boys, both aged 15, have been released without charge and no further action will be taken against them.