NARROW ESCAPE IN FIRE

Chronicle (Levin), 21 June 1949, Page 6

NARROW ESCAPE IN FIRE

Two Children Courageously Rescued DUNEDIN, June 20. Four persons, two children and two adults, are in the Dunedin Hospital suffering froan hurns as the result of a fire which hadly damaged a flat in Hanover Street, this morning. The adults received their injuries when they went to the rescue of the children who would almost certainly have perished in the flames or have heen suffocated, >had they not heen brought to safety. . The injured are:— Mrs. I. Brookes, inarried, burns about the face and hands: Mr. Arthur Johnston, aged 19, garage employee, burns about the face. Mary Agnes Grigg, aged 1 year and 11 months, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. G. Grigg, and Gordon John Grigg, aged three years, their son. A third child, Zela Grigg, was affected by smoke but escaped injury. The flat in which the fire oecurred is situated over a general store kept by Mrs. M. Allison and was occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Grigg and their three children, the eldest being three years and the youngest six months. At the time Ihe fire occurred the parents were away, Mrs. Grigg, it is understood, being on a visit to her sister who lived a short distanee away. The fire was first seen by Mrs. Brookes who lived nearby. She ealled out to Mrs. Allison who was busily engaged serving customers at the time. Mrs. Brookes then went to Mr. J. A. White's garage at the corner and informed an employee that she thought t here were children in the flat. Mrs. Brodkes then rushed back to the burning building and went up the only entrance, a narrow stairway leading from Hanover Street. A few moments later she was back oarrying a bundle. It was the child Mary Agnes. Both appeared to he hadly burned. Mrs. Brookes was followed immediately afterwards hy Mr. Johnston who stumbled back again a minute or two later. He was reeling from the effects of burns to his face. It was reported later that another man entered the building in an attempt to rescue the third child but had been

dnven back by flames and dense smoke. By this time the fire brigade had urrived on the seene but it was some time before it was learned that the haby was still there. She was found in a double bed in one of the bedrooins in which comparatively little damage was done by the fire. Mr. Johnston, with his face swathed in bandages, was seen some time .later in -hospital. "I did just what anyoae else would have done, " he told a reporter. "It was, a grim enough business entering the burning flat, especially when you knew there were children there. I thought it was all up with both of us at one stage. The door leading into one of the bedrooms closed on me and I suppose it was warped because of the heat and I had to wrench it very hard to get it opeti again. The greatest sliock came to me when T reached hospital. T then realised that there was a third child in the place. I informed one of my workinates and he rushed back to iii i n.ii

Lnform the firemen. It was wonderful i to hear that the child had been rescued and that it was quite all right." Mr. Johnston said he wouid like the puhiic to know something of the "truly courageous actions of Mrs. Brookes. She not only showed hr,avery hut resource as well. But for her it is likely that two children would have aied from burns or suffocation."