FIRE IN PAEROA.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXX, Issue 5497, 6 November 1929, Page 2

FIRE IN PAEROA.

OUTBREAK IN WASH-HOUSE. LITTLE DAMAGE DONE. At 8.30 o’clock last evening Miss D. Wilson gave the alarm, and a quick clearance from the station was made by the brigade. The outbreak occurred in a wash-house in Seymour Street at the residence of Mr Scott. Rubbish had during the day been burned off in a defective fireplace -in the wash-house, and the flames had passed through the joints between the bricks and ignited the walls. The flames, which had only a slight hold, were extinguished before the brigade arrived, and as the engine was about to draw up at the scene the firemen were redirected to lower Hill Street by the railway station. Once again the ludicrous spectacle was witnessed of a fire-engine proceeding silently through the streets of Paeroa to a fire. Thanks only to the, prompt clearance of the station did the engine get away from the maze of fast-moving motor traffic that soon accumulated. A siren on the engine is not only demanded in law, but is also a necessary and economically sound proposition not alone because it is a protection to the lives of the men on the engine and to other traffic and pedestrians, but also as an indicator of the direction in which the engine is travelling to firemen making for the scene by means other than the engine. Last night, as on previous occasions, firemen not on the engine were absolutely at a loss as to where the fire was, and were greatly inconvenienced by having to run in various directions. For eighteen months now the fire brigade has been urging the Borough Council to provide this siren, but the matter has been allowed to drift on in the most unsatisfactory way, the expense evidently being considered sufficient reason for neglect of the law.