SERIOUS GRASS FIRE

Hawera Star, Volume XLV, 30 January 1926, Page 5

SERIOUS GRASS FIRE

BIG AREA SWEPT. IN CANTERBURY DISTRICT. ONE MAN BADLY HURT. (BY TELEGItAPiv PRESS ASSOCIATION.) ASHBURTON, Jan. 29. For the last, week the Ashburton County has had visitations of a .series of grass fires, attributed to sparks from railway engines. Until to-day the damage was confined to plantations and hedge® alongside the lines, principally the main, lines. To-day, however, a fire in the Ohertsey district assumed serious proportions, causing damage to pasture®, crops and buildings valued at several thousands of pounds. The most serious losers were : —O. Flynn : Stable and two paddocks of oats; J. Cameron: Stables and outbuildings ;L. Hanrahan: Three large stacks of oats. William Page, motor garage proprietor, of Ashburton, was severely burned in endeavouring to remove his motor-car, which caught fire and was destroyed while lie was assisting to remove furniture from Hanrahan’s house, which was threatened by fire,. He was burned about the back of the head, the shoulders and hips. In an effort to save himself lie rolled into an adjacent water-race. He is now in hospital in a most serious condition.

This afternoon tlie fire was blazing on a front of four miles and was travelling at the rate- of four or five miles an hour. Hundreds of men battled for hours against the flames and worked desperately in the removal of furniture, stock and other goods to places of safety.

Fortunately no homesteads were burned, though several were threatened, some when women and children were inside with no means of access. Providentially the wind was playing with the flames, and by a freak of chance twisted the fire away when all hope seemed over. In Cameron's case the verandah was burned but was. pulled away by the fire fighters and the flames left the building itself untouched. Among the many assisting in the work were numbers of women and girls, who drove off the stock and removed furniture outside the line of fire. Tlie fire had extended to a distance of ten miles from Qhertsey when it was subdued. Much of the credit of this is due to Mr. Alan Watson, who drove a. tractor, dragging a four-furrow plough over a line about seven miles long through fences and over water races, thus forming an effective barrier against which tlie fire died down. The most serious fires prior to that at Chert sc y occurred in the Westerfield district, where a total area of 128 acres of plantation was destroyed, despite the effoitis of a large number of men, who, in common with other localities, have been organised by the- county council. Tlie damage in this case is estimated at £IOOO.