FIRE NEAR TOWNSHIP.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 69, 23 March 1931, Page 9

FIRE NEAR TOWNSHIP.

TRAFFIC THROUGH SMOKE, MINE BUILDINGS IN DANGER* CHANGE OF WIND FEARED. (From Our Own Correspondent.) WHANGAREI, this day. A fierce fire is raging on the Whangarei Land Company's property near Hikurangi. The holding is 2000 acres of peat land, with a covering of rushes and tea-tree. The Hikurangi Coal Company's mine is in close proximity, and the buildings at the pit's mouth will be endangered by a change of wind. Adjoining settlers are alarmed at the outbreak, which first started some days ago and increased in intensity tenfold yesterday and to-day. Some houses are scarcely habitable on account of the billowing smoke. Traffic on McLeod's Flat was almost at a standstill this morning. Other fires burning in the vicinity have contributed their quota of smoke, clouding the road from the Jordan turn-off to the foot of Kauri Hill, in a mantle of choking fumes. For three miles traffic proceeded almost blindly, and several times collisions were narrowly averted. Passengers in a bus had an eerie experience at the first railway crossing near Hikurangi. They could hear a train approaching, but could not see it. The driver wisely pulled up until the train had passed.