BOILER-ROOM BLAZE

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 60, 8 September 1937, Page 12

BOILER-ROOM BLAZE

AT SUPREME COURT

STACKS OF WOOD ALIGHT

Discovered just after 10.30 this morning by a messenger who was driven back by heat when he opened the door of the boiler-room, a fire in the basement of the Supreme Court kept firemen occupied for more than threequarters of an hour. Cords of kindling wood stacked near the furnace had caught alight, and work by the brigadesmen in the enclosed space was made more difficult by the failure of the lights. The Court sat unperturbed. One engine arriving at the Lambton Quay entrance of the right-of-way at about 10.45 attracted the nucleus of a crowd, and clouds of pungent smoke pouring apparently from the foundations of the Supreme Court increased the number of sightseers. Those in the Land and Income Tax Department block looked on in comfort. After an inspection of the seat of the fire the engine was taken round to Stout Street and a lead of hose run out. A supply of water at the door of the boiler-room, however, enabled the fire to be put out with hand pumps in about half an hour. Th boiler-room is walled in concrete, with a thick, brick roof, but the smoke seeped up into ,the Judges' library, which has a wooden floor above the brick. Within a quarter of an hour of the outbreak the library was filled.