A WORKMAN'S STORY

Taranaki Herald, Volume LV, Issue 13928, 11 June 1909, Page 4

A WORKMAN'S STORY

The story told by one of the workmen who was on the spot when tho fire was first noticed, shows how rapidly the flames extended. There wero, lie says, about 300 men in the yards at the time. He was inspecting a railway waggon, "when he heard some one call out "Fire!" The flames wero airoadv breaking out of the shed wbon he and a large number of other workmen ran to try and save the other sheds. Nine hundred casks of petroleum had been unloaded only three days h#fore, and the men started to roll then out or the way as fast as they could. But tbe smoke, which spread all over the yard, nearly choked them, and the flames seemed to follow on their hoels. All they could do was to run for thoir lives. A workman who was on the roof of the electric power building was injured in one of his shoulders by a fall, another man was nearly electrocuted by catching hold of a iive wiro ; but neither of them was fatally injured. The damages are, of course, enormous, and cannot yet be even approximately estimated. Three great sheds, or warehouses, have been entirely destroyed, and only some paits of the walls and twisted iron girdors remain. About three o'clock the firo ceased to make further progress, and the firemen were able to save part of the oil and some naphtha in ono of the basements.