SCRUB FIRE ON HILLS

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29760, 1 March 1962, Page 15

SCRUB FIRE ON HILLS

House Menaced

At Hoon Hay

Residents of Halswell, employees of the Halswell County Council and three fire engines fought a scrub fire which approached within 30ft of at least one house in Hoon Hay yesterday afternoon.

The fire, which began on the property of Mr W. E. H. Crook yesterday morning after “burning off” of scrub and broom the night before, was noticed by Mr C. R. Beauchamp, who farms nearby. After trying unsuccessfully to put the blaze out himself, Mr Beauchamp warned other residents of the fire by telephone from the house of Mr P. B. Oxenbridge. The house, in which were Mrs Oxenbridge and three young children, was 75 yards from the blaze at the time.

A unit from the Sydenham sub-station arrived soon afterwards and immediately called headquarters for assistance. In the early afternoon about 12 local residents and five or six employees of the Halswell council arrived at the scene and fought the blaze with wet sacks, shovels and one or two knapsack sprays. The fire, fanned by an easterly wind, began near the valley floor, and climbed up the valley, coming within 30ft of Mr Oxenbridge’s bouse.

While her husband, who had been called from work, was helping fight the fire, Mrs Oxenbridge prepared to evacuate the house.

The fire was stopped from reaching the property by a fire break, 15 to 20ft wide, which had been dug outside a pine hedge surrounding the quarter-acre section on which the house stands.

The blaze burnt about four acres of land, Mr Oxenbridge said. No property was damaged.