PROTECTION AGAINST FIRE.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume 14, Issue 1129, 22 February 1870, Page 3

PROTECTION AGAINST FIRE.

In those days of hot winds and high thermometer, when the risk from fire must be considerable, it is interesting to know that a | firm in .Dunedin, Messrs. A. and T. Burt, are the manufacturers of a portable fire Annihihitor, which is snid to be at once cheap and effective. One has lately been imported by our townsmen, Messrs. Neal and Close, who have tried it and found it to answer well. The following account of a trial of this instrument is from an old number of the Evening Star, a Dunedin paper : — - An area of about 60 feet in diameter was enclosed by ropes, and within this three 'large fires of shavings, tar, old casks, cases, and a varity of inflammable materials, were successfully kindled. Capt. Rees, of the Fire Brigade, and several other gentlemer acted as referees, to decide when tlie fires had attained sufficient strength ; when this was declared the fir.--, fire was put out with two machines in about five minutes. The second fire was then kindled, and allowed to attain such a Itereeness that the crowd was forced to retire. When the machine commenced playing upon this large fire the effect was almost instantaneous, and in even less time than that taken to extinguish the former one the flames were subdued. It is worthy of remark that only two eight-gallon machines were in use at one time, one being in process of charging, and only three being on the ground altogether. The time taken to fill, charge, and havo one ready for action did not exceed two minutes. One machine, when tried, threw a jet right across the enclosed space, a distance of nearly 60 feet, so that a jet might easily be projected over almost any house in Dunedin.