TRAPPED BY FIRE

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 26, 30 July 1938, Page 11

TRAPPED BY FIRE

WOMAN JUMPS ■■■•■; ,<-■■ .

SERIOUS INJURIES

(By Telegraph—Press Association.)

AUCKLAND, TKs Day,

Trapped by a solid wall of flame that blocked all exits from the upper storey, and the bedroom in which she slept, and terrified by flames shooting from windows behind her, Mrs. Annie Elizabeth Maltby, an. elderly married woman, jumped from the verandah of the roof in her home in St. James Square in. the city early fbffs morning, and was taken to hospital with, serious injuries. Her daughter, Alice Margaret, aged 15, and hex son, Walter Albert, aged 18, engineer's apprentice, are also in hospital- Both were injured when escaping from the blazing five^ roomed wooden house. Five people were asleep in the house. When. Mrs. Maltby was awakened by the fire; she screamed to her husband, who rushed ■ to the front of the house and found the sitting-room blazing. Mrs. Maltby became terrified and jumped, falling on . a picket fence. The £Erl and the' boy were helped down by an elder brother, who escaped uninjured. Mrs. Maltby is. suffering: from, serious burns and an injured back, and her condition is serious. The condition of her two children,, who received--.Burns, is not serious. • »n The house is a charred shell, except one back room occupied'by Mrs.,F. W. Ockleford. • * .-.; The girl Margaret jumped into- the arms of a spectator in the street.--Wal-ter was helped, down, by his 'elder-bro-ther, Arthur, who escaped unhurt. Mr. Maltby, sen., escaped unhurt through, the back door. «.-, The central fibre station, received, two calls and had an engine at thej.spene of the fire a few hundred yards; away I within, a minute and a half.. The house was burning furiously, with, the &unes spreading to wooden houses crowded close on either side. Despite the-fact that one house was only inches.^away it was saved. Only the kitchen; of Mr. Maltby's house was saved,.,, all the other rooms being charred beyond repair. The furniture and ' clothing ■ were destroyed. . , *"~ - Mrs. Maltby and^the children^^ere in night attire when they - escaped. Both boys, who are steadying. engineering, .lost books valued at .£2O. "1 heard my wife calling something about a iire from her room upstairs," said Mr. Maltby, sea, today. *T made for the sitting-room, where I found flames leaping from the chimney; the furniture blazing, and the room an. inferno. The family had to escape through the top windows. Arthur-was unable to '.open his window, but he smashed the glass , and helped ~ the others on to the roof of the verandah-. Then my wife jumped." % ';