An estimated 19’800 parents from all over the county attended an open air drinking session at 10am near the Ballygawley roundabout as thousands of children returned to school after another wet, wild and windy summer holiday period.

Police confirmed that no arrests were made at the impromptu get-together as children were informed by head masters to walk home from school due to lack of sober drivers.

Paddy McCourt, a father of four primary school children, explained:

“Someone put up on Facebook this morning about having a bottle of Buckfast at the roundabout after dropping the children off and before long the place was hiving with hundreds of ecstatic parents. Don’t get me wrong, I like my children alright but I couldn’t do one more day of separating them after another fight over the charger for an iPad. And there’s only so many times you can head to an overclouded Barrys in Portrush or visit the granny in Dungannon.”

Conversely, Ballygawley teacher Harry Quinn was reprimanded by his school governors for being photographed drinking with the revellers, despite supposedly being back to work today.  Quinn, who also has four children at primary school age, was described as ‘screaming and shouting like a mad man’ as he was pulled away from the party by several colleagues from the local school.

Meanwhile a P6 boy was sent home from St Malachy’s in Moygashel after he wrote a 2-sentence reply to the ice-breaker exercise of ‘What did you do over the summer?’. Head teacher Mrs Fullerton insisted that “Nothing. Sure wasn’t the weather shit” was not an acceptable reply.