FOUR FIREMEN ENDANGERED

Press, Volume XCVI, Issue 28429, 8 November 1957, Page 14

FOUR FIREMEN ENDANGERED

Clothes Catch Alight

(New Zealand Press Association) AUCKLAND, November 7. Four firemen, their clothes alight, ran from a blazing building in Mount Eden this afternoon and rolled in puddles on the ground to extinguish the flames which threatened to envelop them. The men were fighting a fire which raged for an hour in a factory filled with highly-inflam-mable materials. Thousands of pounds’ worth of damage was done to the premises, owned by Winstones, Ltd., and occupied by James W. Wark, Ltd., spring makers and manufacturers of tubular steel furniture. The fire began about 2 p.m. when a spark from a spot welder caused a barrel of dipping lacquer containing "thinners” to burst into flames. Within minutes, most of the building—a two-storeyed roughcast structure of 4800 sq ft—was alight. Flames were leaping through the roof as the staff bundled the office safe, equipment, and records on to the footpath. The four firemen whose clothes caught alight were almost trapped inside the building when blazing thinners “blew back” at them. They raced outside, threw themselves to the ground, which was swimming with water, and rolled around until their uniforms became saturated and ceased smoking. Only one of the firemen was injured, and he suffered only minor burns to the legs. A representative of James W. Wark, Ltd., said that the damage would amount to “several thousand pounds at the very least.” The building and its contents were insured.