BIG GARAGE BURNED

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXII, Issue 19454, 13 November 1925, Page 7

BIG GARAGE BURNED

SPECTACULAR BLAZE IN BLENHEIM MASS OF FLAMES IN FIVE MINUTES A DOZEN CARS BURNED. (Per Press Association.! BLENHEIM, Nov. 12. This afternoon an outbreak of fire at Newman Bros.’ Garage swept the entire building from Wvnen to High Streets. The fire was of a most spectacular nature. The building was a mass of flames within five minutes of the alarm being given. The fire originated in the workshop where a mechanic was soldering down a small tin of lubricating oil when it burst into flame. An attempt *was made to smother the flames. Chemical extinguishers were brought into use but without avail. The brigade was then summoned, but before it could arrive the flames had spread to the oil soaked workbenches and, fanned from one end of the building to the other, quickly ignited the whole place.

A service car from Nelson arrived in the garage just as the flames burst through the workshop door, and the driver lost no time in backing his car into the street. Two or three other cars w’ere also run out into the street, but in an incredibly short space of time the smoke was dense and the flames spread so rapidly that the building became untenable, and from ten to a dozen cars had to be abandoned to their fate.

Some of these cars, which have been exensively damaged, were brand new, the number including a valuable demonstration car of a make new to Blenheim which arrived only this morning. It is impossible at this stage to compute the damage to the cars, most of which "were privately owned and w T ere merely garaged at Newmans’.

The outbreak was so sudden that there was no time to save the firm’s books or office documents, but fortunately these escaped destruction and were salved wet but still readable. The details as to insurances and estimates as to damage were not available.