HOUSE DESTROYED

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 153, 20 February 1932, Page 5

HOUSE DESTROYED

EARLY MORNING FIRE IN TAREWA ROAD OCCUPANTS' NARROW ESCAPE

Roused from sleep shortly before two o'clock this morning', Mr. William Berryman, of Tarewa Road, was just in time to awaken his wife and family of four young children sleeping in an adjacent room, and escape from the burning ruins of his home. The children had to he lowered through a window, the youngest, a child of four years of age, in its night attire. Mr. Berryman immediately rush ed to the alarm box on the Lake Road, but although the brigade was quickly on the scene, the building was a seething mass of flames when it arrived. The hose had to be run over four hundred yards from the fire point. but as soon as pressure was obtained, the flames were got under control. A garage and wash-house adjoining the main dwelling were also in danger, but an incipient second outbreak was quickly quelled. The cause of the fire is unknown, although it is surmised that an electric iron which Mrs. Berryman had been using earlier in the evenir.g maj' have been left turned on. The family retired to bed about 10 p.m., and it was not until Mr. Berryman was disturbed by the road of the flames in the sitting room, nextc door to the bedroom, that they became aware that apything was amiss. Mr. Berryman rushed from the bedroojn andopened the door of the sitting room, to Be met by a wall of flame. He was unable to close the door, and the flames spread through into the passage and the remainder of the house. The dwelling and outhouses were insured, under three separate covers, for £375, but the fur-niture was not coverefl. Despite the late hour, a crowd quickly collected, but could only watch the demolition of the dwelling from a distance.