PAVEMENT ON FIRE.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 59, Issue 18, 1 November 1938, Page 6

PAVEMENT ON FIRE.

AN EXPLOSION AT AUCKLAND. UNDERGROUND CABLE FAULT. (Per Press Association.) AUCKLAND. October 31. A stone’s throw from a block of shops which was wrecked by a- violent explosion on the morning of January 9, a further explosion caused by a fault in an underground electric power cable, occurred outside the premises of Puritan Home Cookery in Remuern road, opposite the Remuern. Post Office shortly before 16 o’clock to-night. Four engines of the Auckland Metropolitan Fire Brigade arrived at the scene of the explosion; hut although the flames were rising from the pavement in front of the shop, the services of the firemen were not required. Members of the staff of the Auckland Electric Power Board were also quickly summoned and hv switching off the current in the affected area they were able to remove the possibility of further danger before any great damage was caused. Mr P. H. Partridge (proprietor of the Puritan Home Cookery) was in the living quarters above the shop when the explosion occurred, and his assistant, Mr W. Holehouse, was in the shop. The explosion, according to both Mr Partridge and Mr Holehouse, was of sufficient force to shake the premises to ascertain extent, and they rushed to the street, to see flames issuing from the bitumen pavement. The only actual damage caused by the explosion was the tracking of a corner of one of tho plate-glass window® in Mr Partridge’s shop. Mr G. N. Downs, who occupies a flat above the block of shops where the explosion occurred, said that, his first thought was that.a. heavy lorry had run into the front of the building. The noise of the explosion was just like the noise of such an impact, and the building was shaken.