SERIOUS GRASS FIRES

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLVIII, Issue 2992, 30 January 1926, Page 2

SERIOUS GRASS FIRES

IN ASHBURTON DISTRICT. Ashburton, January 29. For the last week Ashburton County has had visitations of a series of grass fires attributed to sparks from railway engines. Until to-day the damage was confined to the plantaA-'ijs md hedges alongside the liuss. the main lines. To-day, however, a fire in the Chertsey district assumed serious proportions, causing damage to pastures, crops, and buildings estimated at several thousands of pounds.

! The most serious losers were: . C. Flynn’s stable and two paddocks of oats, J. Cameron’s sfables and , out-building's, and L. Hanrahan’s three large stacks of oats. William Page, a motor garage proprietor, of Ashburton, was severlv burned in endeavouring to remove his motor-ear, which had caught fire, and was destroyed, while he was assisting *to remove furniture from Mr. Hanrahan’s house, which was threatened by fire, lie was burned about the back of the head, fhe shoulders, and the hips. In an effort to save himself he rolled into an adjacent water race. He is now in hospital in a most serious condition. This afternon the fire was blazing on a front of four miles, travelling at a rate of four or five miles an hour. Hundreds of men battled for hours against the flames, and worked desperately in the removal of furniture, stock, and other goons to places of safety. Fortunately no homesteads were burned, though several were threatened. When some women and children were inside a building with no means of exit, providentially the wind, which was playing with the flames, by a freak of chance, twisted the firg away when all hope seemed lost. In the ease of Cameron's house, the veranda was burned, but was pulled away by the tire-fighters, and the flames left the building itself untouched. Among the many assisting in the work were a number of women and girls, who drove off the stock and removed furniture to outside the line of the fire. The fire extended to a distance of ten miles from Chertsey before it was subdued. Much of the credit for this is due to Mr. Alan Watson, who drove a tractor, dragging a four-furrow plough over a line about seven miles long, through fences and over water races, thus helping to form an effective barricade against which the fire died down. Yesterday the most serious fire prior to that at Chertsey occurred in the Westerfield district, where 120 acres of a plantation were destroyed, despite the efforts of a large number of men, who, as in other localities, have been organised by the County Council. Damage estimated at a thousand pounds was caused.