SAFES AND FIRES.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XXXIII, Issue 10818, 10 November 1906, Page 5 (Supplement)

SAFES AND FIRES.

How safes and strong-rooms fared m the San Francisco fire is described by Douglas Owen, a well-known authority on insurance questions, m the Shipping Gazette. It was said m San Francisco that 75 per cent, of the safes and strong-rooms failed to justify their names, and m the case of the remainder tlie strength or thickness of the material, or the skill of tlie makers liad nothing to do with their coming through the ordeal intact. Mr Owen thinks that one make of safe m that holocaust was no better than another. Nearly all the safes and strongrooms to be seen among the blackened ruins were open, and the records inside were cinders. The fact is, says Mr Owen, that there comes a moment when, m the experience of conflagrations, the terms fire-proof and heat-proof become merely, comparative phrases. The force and fury of tne heat at San Francisco must have been beyond all imagining. The draught was so great that letters were whirled a dozen miles away, and eight miles across the bay the night was as light as day. A lady informed Mr Owen that all the rosebuds m her garden, some miles away, came into bloom m one night, forced by the super-heated air. There is a suspicion of American exaggeration about this story, but so many queer things happened then that it would be rash to question its truth. But safes are m greatest danger when the flames die down and the heated debris is left to cool. At San Francisco ironwork and brickwork were glowing hot, and there was no water to cool them with. "So that to a great extent the safes could not be got at or dug out till many days, m some cases running into weeks. They lay m the glowing mass and baked. An engineer has just told me that on August 22nd— four months after the fire— whilst engaged on a ruined site, he encountered a current of warm air, and on investigation found great heat below, kept m by tbe overlying brickwork. He remarked that he had no doubt that if the bricks were to be removed the fire would declare itself. So that it is easy to understand how the process of baking was continued, generally, long after the fire had burnt itself out." If London were visited by a. similar conflagration, and the smouldering debris were not cooled by water, the safes and strong-rooms would suffer m the same way. It is a question of water supply. Safes can only be absolutely fire-proof and heat-proof when there is a water service to supplement the construction of the manufacturer.