LAST YEAR’S FIRES

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LV, Issue 17229, 8 April 1930, Page 11

LAST YEAR’S FIRES

CALLS INCREASED BY FIVE 16 FRIDAY OUTBREAKS Superstitious residents of Gisborne will not be surprised to hear that Friday was an unlucky day last year, so far as outbreaks of (ire were concerned. No loss than Id of the 49 alarms received by the Gisborne lire brigade came in on Fridays, and the proportion of false alarms was very small. Sundays provided the next most important contribution to the total ol the year’s .flies, the alarms received during the week-ends numbering eight, including three grass lires. In view id ille fact that many houses are unoccupied during a good part of every Sunday, and that grass lires usually occur wheii picnickers are about, the comparison between Fridays and Snndavs is all the more striking.

Two of tin* calls received at the station were not responded to. lor the reason that the outbreak in each case was beyoltd Hie borough boundary. The Fire Board does not maintain the brigade to light tires outside the boi6ugh,_ especially when there is a chance that the brigade might be away from the station on such a call, and thus be unable to answer promptly an alarm from some quarter inside the borough. Of the other -17 calls, live were falsi 1 alarms, Init ltd entice rued imtbioaks in dwellings, six of which proved to be undamaged, however. Two houses were totally destroyed, two very considerably lamaged, two more only slightly less damaged, and eight others damaged in lesser degrees. THE VARIOUS CAUSES 'flip march of progress is represented in the cause of these tires, electric irons and kettles figuring among the list; an incubator which became overheated was the cause of one house lire, and a motorist’s oversight in leaving his handbrake on while hi 1 drove his ear about was responsible for another class of cull. Only six id. the calls were related to outbreaks in cars and lurries, this being rather a good record in view of the number of cars now in use, One car took (ire thiough benzine leaking on to a hot exhaust pipe, this type of mishap being less frequent than might be expected from the number of ancient: ears to be seem on the roads.

The value of the Duplex alarm system with its glass-laced boxes, is indicated in the fact that 22 alarms were turned in by this medium, while a similar number came direct by telephone call to the station-house. Five calls came by messenger from within short distances of the station. Tim insurances on buildings in the borough affected by fires during the past rear aggregated £H>,9(>(), and the insured value of their contents were £9205; the - two lives outside the borough involved an insured value o.i with contents insured lot £.>-0The insurance companies paid out a comparatively small proportion of the above-mentioned values, owing largely to the smart work of the fire brigade in quelling Iho outbreaks. Buildr.ms which were uninsured at the time of”the lives affecting them suffered damage estimated in the aggregate al £SIS, while the value of uninsured contents of destroyed buildings was placed at £595.