MODERN PLANTS.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 79, 3 April 1928, Page 10

MODERN PLANTS.

THE USE OF SAND. EXPLOSIONS EXPLAINED

Some interesting information in regard to petrol lires was given to a "Stur" representative by Mr. H. H. Stewart, of the firm of I'aykel Bros. The reason for thehuge volume of dense smoke, he said, was slow combustion. The ;:ir could not get too far into tho building, and that was the reason for'so much flame appearing at the open windows and doors and around the top of the walls. He explained that the only way to deal with such fires was to adopt the system, in vogue in most of the large cities in America, where they used a steam jet which ejected sand to smother the flames. Most of the fuel, he added, was passing into the air in the form of heavy smoke. Ho likened it to & motor-car with too rich a mixture. Ho explained a fire in an oil gusher;in Texas, which he himsfelf witnessed, /'ike it was impossible to put the fire out by ordinary means, a tunnel a few feet under the ground was built all round the bore. This was filled with dynamite and fired. The explosion was so violent that it extinguished the flame of the gusher in the same way as one would blow out a candle.

Referring to the present fire. Mr. Stewart said that If the walls of the building collapsed and a free plav of air was allowed right through the building it wotjld soon become white hot. He considered it a very lucky thing that the walls had stood up and prevented ;big volume* of air getting to the heart? of ther-material. So far as the vaxploeions were concerned, lie said that th^ pressure venerated by the heat caused the fuel In the tins to vapourise and explode. When t-he liot fuel was released in the air if burst into flame immediacy and made the brilliant flashes that so many people had seen from a distance. It required {>lcven parts of air to one part of benzine to cause an explosive mixture. The fuel In the present fire was so dens" that al! Ihe time it was smothering itself. That was why- it was such a low temperature fire.