SPARKS FROM LOCOMOTIVES

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3009, 21 February 1917, Page 6

SPARKS FROM LOCOMOTIVES

A SUBURBAN COMPLAINT. Sir, —In a recent issue of The Dominion appeared a complaint from certain flax-growers about the risk created by sparks from locomotives. To this was appended a statement from the General Manager of the New Zealand llail.ways, indicating that such risks were negligible on account of the efficacy of the spark-arresting apparatus iiseu in the. engines Employed, on our lines. I am not an engineer, and know nothing about the apparatus in question; but 1 am a resident in a suburb where fires caused by sparks . from passing locomotives occur almost daily. It may be that the spark-arresters are becoming worn out, or that they have been accidentally inserted upside down, or work the wrong way, or that the up-to-date engines are required for our I innumerable and' indispensable racetrains; but scarcely a day passes at present without a fire; and the residents here have little faith in the patent spark-arresters, which seem to work so wonderfully well on paper. Recently, e.g. (on the 10th inst.) five fires were kindled between Ngaio and Khandallah by the 12.20 train. Another blaze resulted from the 1.22. The 5.25 also kept some of us busy. A goods train went up about 8 p.m., making a wonderful display of fireworks.( As this train, often overloaded, frequently sticks on the incline, this pyrotechnio display may Eavo fitly signalised its success 'in • pulling through; but it was only the dampness of the grass that prevented another conflagration. On the I.9th inst. two fires raged for some time at Khandallah (not to speak of others at Ngaio), and threatened" some of the houses near the line. Again and again throughout this dry summer catastrophes have been averted by the timely intervention of watchful neighbours and tho efforts of the surfacemen. The writer travelled from Wellington by the 10.20 p.m. on the 19th, and the spark-sprink-lers seemed to be in good going order. I am sorry that I cannot endorse the words of>-the General Manager. They would only lull people into a false sense of security, i The apparatus he speaks of seems to 1 be a rank failure; and the residents whose "nerves have' been shaken and whose rest has been marred by these spark-squirting locomotives, hope that some more efficient apparatus will be introduced into the smoke-stacks of- our engines.—l am, etc., J.C.