FALSE ALARMS

Auckland Star, Volume LXXII, Issue 170, 21 July 1941, Page 2

FALSE ALARMS

FICTITIOUS FIRES AMBULANCE ALSO CALLED A series of malicious false alarms by telephone were answered by Auckland iire brigades on Saturday night and Sunday morning, and the St. John Ambulance were also summoned by telephone to a fictitious fire. This is the second time within a fortnight that false messages have been given over the telephone to fire brigades and ambulances. The man responsible for calling out lire engines 'and ambulances to a fictitious railway smash at the Auckland railway yards on July G, was arrested within a week, and on Friday he was sentenced to eighteen months' imprisonment. The first of this second series of hoaxes was a telephone message to the central fire station about 8.40 on Saturday night. A man's voice reported that a fire had broken out in a Queen Street fish shop. This message was also given to the St. John Ambulance headquarters, and two fire brigades, an ambulance from Rutland Street, and one from the Queen's wharf station were sent to the scene, only to find that the calls were maliciously false. Later, at 11.30 on Saturday night, in response to another telephone message, a fire engine from the Western Districts station and another from the Central station were dispatched to a fictitious fire in a wash'nouse in Franklin Road. A woman's voice gave the third false alarm at 7.30 yesterday morning, when brigades from the Parnell and Remuera stations were sent to another non-existent washhouse fire, in Portland Road, Remuera.