BLOW OUT.

Waipawa Mail, Volume LIV, Issue 28, 18 November 1932, Page 3

BLOW OUT.

AN UNPLEASANT SURPRISE. ROTORUA, Last night. When Mrs Maro Hicks, of Ohinemutu, went to g'et the kettle from the family thermal cooking hole at 3 p.m. on Wednesday afternoon she met with an unpleasant surprise. As she stooped for the kettle she heard an ominous rumbling beneath her feet and fled for her life. She was just in time, for a few seconds later afternoon tea and the evening dinner went up 30 feet in the air. Not only did Mrs Hicks have a lucky escape, hut it was most fortunate that none of her children were in the immediate vicinity at the time. The steam holes, two in number, are situated in a garden in the midst of a group of cottages. Mrs Hicks’ home and another are quite close to the spot. The holes served not only for cooking purposes, hut also supplied beautiful clear hot water for three baths, where there were conveniences for both bathing and washing clothes. Now all connection with the baths has been severed and the one on Mrs Hicks’ property has been filled with liquid mud.

Although water and steam rose fully 30 feet in the air, practically no debris was ejected and no damage was done to the garden or cottages, but where clear boiling water once welled up and clean steam provided heat for cooking there are now but two gaping holes in the rock about two feet in diameter, with muddy boiling water at the bottom.