FIREPROOF CLOTHES

Grey River Argus, 20 January 1943, Page 2

FIREPROOF CLOTHES

SAVING AIRMEN’S LIVES. SYDNEY, Jan., 13 Flame-proof clothing, with which Britain’s Air Ministry is experimenting, is exnected t" save lives and limbs of hundreds of airmen, reports a Sydney Sun London correspondent. Government experts in Britain are watching demonstrations of a secret process b v which boots and overalls are treated with a solution that is reported to be proof even against petrol flames. These experiments were startea by Sir Hector Macneal, 63-year-old ship-owner, when he saw many men in hospital suffering from burns. He decided then and there to bear the cost of experimenting with fire-re-sistant clothing, and two Croydon scientists, father and son namerd Petzold, took up the search for a method of making all flymg-kit flame-proof. , That was in October,. 1940, and they have evolved what they call the Macneal process. Official have been applied tc boots, ear-flaps, and gloves, also to gabardine materials and overalls. The fire-proofing solution has also been used on aircraft frames An Artic explorer, Surgeon-Com-mander E. W. Bingham, is the designer of new cold-proof clothes for seamen. His new garment will be tested on a large scale on the next convoy to Russia A two-piec e windproof garment is worn unde; an un-der-garment of duffle. It is tied with strings at the waist and amcl.es, and supplemented bv special boots and woollen socks. ‘‘lt is no blooming fashicn-plate, but it looks mighty good to me,” said a merchant seaman when shown a new garment.