LUCKY ESCAPE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 306, 28 December 1939, Page 9

LUCKY ESCAPE.

TOWN OF NEWCASTLE.

EXPLOSION OF TANK.

ONE ENGINEER KILLED.

(From Our Own Correspondent.)

SYDNEY, December 21

Newcastle had a lucky escape from a serious explosion, which might have wrecked a good portion of the town, when one of the oil tanks at the C.O.R. Depot at Wickham exploded and caught fire 011 Saturday afternoon. Mr. N. N. Nathan, an engineer employed by the C.0.R., was inspecting the tank when the explosion occurred and was blown to pieces. A horrified onlooker saw his body thrown 50 feet into the air clean over another tank to land on the concrete roadway, 100 ft away. At the same moment the lid of the tank crumpled inwards and dense smoke and flames began to pour into the air. Newcastle fire brigade quickly concentrated on the scene. Police, aided by members of the Australian Garrison Force and naval reservists, struggled to keep back ttie huge cfowd which quickly assembled and warned people living nearest the tank to get out of their homes. Remarkable scenes were witnessed as residents hastily got together whatever occurred to them on the spur of the moment to be their most valuable belongings and evacuated their homes. A number of residents, who had been absent from their homes when tho fire broke out, rushed back but were prevented by the police from approaching their dwellings. However, as it turned out, the fire brigades were able to confine the fire to the one tank.

Their operations were watched by thousands of people who had grandstand views of the spectacle from the hilly ground around the tanks. They were attracted not only by the aound of the explosion and the huge cloud of smoke and flames, but by the sudden frenzied blaring of a steamer's siren. It waa a tanker which had been discharging kerosene into the tank when the explosion occurred and was in great danger, being so close to the fire. In response to its shrieking siren a tug dashed up and towed it to a safer anchorage. With flames licking the sides of a big petrol tank alongside the smaller tank which exploded, the firemen fought the blaze in constant fear that a disastrous explosion might occur at any minute. The firemen pumped thousands of gallons of water on to the adjacent tanks to prevent them from bursting, and when the wind died down were able to subdue the fire by pouring foamito an to it. The tank which exploded had a capacity of 300,000 gallons and was half full. When the fire was subdued it was estimated that 50,000 gallons remained. One thing which helped to prevent the adjacent petrol tanks from exploding was the fact that they had just been filled up. If they had been only half full, and consequently filled with vapour, the danger Of an explosion would have been much greater. No one knows what caused the explosion, but as it occurred during an electrical storm it may possibly have been caused by lightning.