CANTEEN AND HALL ON FIRE

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 86, 28 April 1937, Page 4

CANTEEN AND HALL ON FIRE

Kopuawhara Public Works Camp MAIL MATTER BURNT Fire totally destroyed the Y.M.C.A. canteen and social hall o£ the Public Works Department camp at- Kopuawhara at 1 a.m. today. Apart from the saving of cash, stamps, postal notes, and a quantity of mail from the Post Office situated in the hall, the building and its contents were a total loss. No knowledge of the cause of the fire is yet available. The building, the property of the Public Works Department, was valued at about £500, while the equipment lost by the Y.M.C.A. included two billiard tables, a talkie projection plaut, canteen stdck and iihrary. The association 's loss is covered by insurance. Telephonic communication was destroyedj but temporary repairs were immediately effected toy Public Works Department lincsmen pending permanent repairs to-day by the Post and Teiegraph Department. Situated about 40 miles north of Wairoa, and seven miles from the Waikokopu harbour and rail terminus, Kopuawhara camp is the main depot for work on the ten-mile stretck of line from Waikokopu north to Tikiwhata, including the Kopuawhara tunnel. In the camp which is the main camp for married men ' on the line there are uSually between 100 and 150 men, with their families, living in cottages in the township. The main office Of the assistattt engineer for the work ott that section is situated at the camp, together with a large school, capable of aecommodating 150 children, the Post and Teiegraph Office and the Y.M.C.A. hut. The hut itself was a centre of the social activity of the camp. Used for recreation purposes, the hall was open at all times of the day, and suppfies were drawn from the canteen there. The postal office was used for the distribution of mail to several other camps in the district, and portion of this mail was destroyed by the flames, which spread qnickly in a high wind and defied the inadequate fire-fighting equipment available.