BALLANTYNE’S FIRE INQUIRY

Press, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 25445, 17 March 1948, Page 6

BALLANTYNE’S FIRE INQUIRY

Witness Describes First Flame Seen

BRIGADESMAN’S THEORY ON LOSS OF LIVES

A description of the first flame appearing in Ballantyne’s building on the afternoon of November 18, given by Junior Station Officer Thomas George Oakman to the Royal Commission of Inquiry yesterday, was that-a pillar of flame came out of the back of Congreve’s building, shot up vertically and split, the flames shooting round the back of Goodman’s building into the first floor and also to the south-west corner of the first floor of Congreve’s building. The flame by-passed the ground floor.

As the officer left in charge of the Colombo street frontage, Officer Oakman said that he had not seen girls in Goodman’s building at any time. If he had known that Officer J. T. Burrows was not taken into Goodman’s building when the smoke developed, he would have gone into the building.

Evidence that Fireman Dobson was inside the entrance to Goodman’s building, unaccompanied by any civilian, for only a few seconds, was given by Third-class Fireman Walter Henry Stockwell. A development in the evidence was the theory of Fourth Officer Arthur Soloman Shah that a number of persons had died in the mercery department on the ground floor of Ballantyne’s building at the corner of Cashel and Colombo streets. He maintained that from the positions of the bodies they could not have died on upper floors. The evidence of members of the Fire Brigade will be concluded this morning, after which technical evidence will be begun. It was expected that Deputy-Superintendent George Barnes would give evidence yesterday afternoon. Mr J. D. Hutchison (counsel for the Fire Board) explained that Mr Barnes was on duty. Notice that the witness was not available should have been given before 3.15 p.m„ said Mr G. G. G. Watson (senior counsel for the Crown), who submitted that Superintendent A. Morrison should have made arrangements to relieve his deputy.