YEAR'S FIRE RECORD.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19831, 29 December 1927, Page 8

YEAR'S FIRE RECORD.

FEW SERIOUS OUTBREAKS.

ELECTRICITY AS CAUSE.

EXTENSION OF CITY BRIGADE.

COMPREHENSIVE IMPROVEMENTS

In a land like Now Zealand, enjoying immunity from the typhoons of the tropics, the hurricanes of America, and the devastating earthquakes of Japan, practically the only menace to property is tho fire fiend. Statistics relative to fire losses in the Dominion make an unenviable record, frequently deplored by insurance interests. During 1927 to date, the loss by fire in the City of Auckland fire district alone has exceeded £66,000 in spite of the fact that there have been few major outbreaks.

It is, perhaps, a moot point whether the universal use of electricity with its wire-fusing dangers has so greatly outweighed the old-time menace of candles and oil lamps. The question was discussed yesterday by Superintendent W. L. Wilson, who in the course of a review of tho " fire year " directed attention to the number of outbreaks noted in the station log as being due to " electricity." Dealing first with the statistical position, Superintendent Wilson said that of the 386 calls received in his district during tho year, 200 were actual fires, 94 were false alarms, 31 wero " chimney flares," 38 were outbreaks in patches of gorse and in rubbish dumps, and 23 came from without the borders of the district. Included in the actual fires were 41 due to the fusing of electric wires—just over 20 per cent, of the total. Fusing ol Street Mains.

While in turn not a few of these related to defects in the electrical wiring of motor-cars, and to fusing in household systems, a substantial element was the fusing of street mains laid under the pavement. When it was suggested to the superintendent that from the Jay point of view these appeared to be the most readily detected and easiest checked he was quick to controvert the idea. He said that as every " man in the street," who had watched with interest the disruption of pavements, knew, electric mains were encased in bitumen—a mineral pitch which when heated by the fierce arcs caused by fusing, gave off a highlyinflammable and explosive gas. Usually in such cases the pavement above the fault melted and the gout of flame which then appeared served as a safety-valve as well as a diversion for passing pedestrians. On the other hand the gas sometimes found its way along loosely-packed underground channels beneath buildings, there finding egress and violently combusting. Not long ago a shop window in Symonds Street had suffered severely from this cause and a structure in Princes Street, opposite the Grand Hotel, had been set on fire through the same agency. " Bitumen gas," so to call it for lack of a more technical name, possessed high explosive qualities, as was evidenced in a case where it had found its way into an underground sewer and, igniting, had blown the heavy iron manhole-top into fragments high into the air.. Without attempting to magnify the menace of electric faults the superintendent mentioned it as one of the more modern causes of fire with which a brigade had to contend.

Two Most Serious Outbreaks. Of the year's fires the most serious in the city area was that involving the total destruction of the Salvation Army Women's Industrial Home at Parnell, when the 25 inmates had a narrow escape. The brigade was hampered by an inadequate water supply, although the three-inch main then giving service had since been replaced with one of double the bore. Early this month the destruction of Messrs. Henderson and Pollard's timber mill ana joinery factory at Mount Eden caused extensive loss, but with these exceptions * the city had been free, from very serious conflagrations. Once again there has been noticeable the absence of fires in structures of modern construction and, if the razing of several well-known landmarks has caused loss and some distress, it is palliated by the knowledge that, there will rise, Phoenix-like, in their stead examples of the classic architecture of the era. Loss of life occurred in two instances —on July 24, when an aged man was burned to death in a whare in Graham Street, and on September 25, when an occupant of a house in Howe Street succumbed from the effects of smoke and heat in an incipient fife in an upstairs bedroom. Mr. Wilson said much had been accomplished during the year in the replacement of mains throughout the fire district with pipes of greater capacity, especially at the Auckland Hospital, where the four-inch main had been replaced with one of six-inch bore, which actually gave' double the fire-fighting efficiency.

Next Year's Building Programme. Due for the most part to the movement toward amalgamation with the city on the part of several of the outlying local bodies, the Auckland City fire district would witness an extensive building programme in the new year. Very shortly tlio old volunteer station at Avon dale would be rebuilt, permanently staffed and supplied with a more modern fire engine. At Tamaki, too, a new station would be erected, the design, as in the case of Avondale, following the lines of the present Point Chevalier structure. The Remuera station would be virtually doubled in size, work there commencing about January 10. A new fire engine, now on order from England and costing about £I2OO, would probably be allocated to the Remuera station. Questioned regarding the wider practise of fire drills in large institutions, Mr. Wilson said the Salvation Army's Children's Home at Ponsonby and the Queen Victoria School for Maori Girls at Parnell were examples of this wise form of precaution against serious fires. A further endeavour would be made in 1928 to introduce fire drill ihto the schools of the city and to advance the education of children in fire prevention. Among the points of interest mentioned by Mr. Wilson were the several successful efforts made during the year to bring to book tlie perpetrators of several of the false alarms maliciously given. He laid emphasis upon the lack of fire escapes at many boarding and apartment houses, suggesting that more stringent legislative provision would have a salutary effect.