£100,000 DAMAGE

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 46, 17 May 1927, Page 10

£IOO,OOO DAMAGE

FIRE AT DOUGLAS WORKS PLUCKY SALVAGE EFFORTS The following message has bee-, transmitted to me by Messrs. How Gibbons, Ltd.: BRISTOL, March 25, 19:;. A great part of the Douglas Motor Works at Kingswood were destroyed by fire this afternoon. The damage is estimated at £loo,oo and nearly 1,000 men are thrown idle at a time when there is a boom in the motor-cycle industry. The premises cover an area of two acres. The fire started in the welding shops and rapidly spread to the assembly department, which has been described as one of the wonders of the engineering world. There were frequent alarming explosions as the flames reached the enamelling stores —one of the workersaid it was just like a bombardmen; during the war. FIRE-FIGHTERS DRIVEN BACK The directors of the firm soon arrived, and Mr. John Douglas organ ised a party of fire-fighters. For 31 minutes they managed to keep the outbreak from spreading, but they had ti retreat before the brigades arrivec. Another director organised a salvag? party. Though many machines were saveu 400 completed Douglas motor-cycles have been destroyed. Adjoining enclosures, roads anl fields were heaped with engines ani motor parts saved from the flames. At one period some of the staff were marooned in a part of the works opposite the fire. as. owing to the intense heat and falling fragments it was net safe for them to leave; but eventual!? they were able to get away by a side entrance. The outbreak was confined mainly to the assembly shop, and offices, foundries and other departments were saved. Many firemen and workmen who assisted in salvage operations had veiy narrow escapes when the sides of the buildings fell out, debris being thrown against buildings on the opposite side of the road A splendid piece of reorganisation saw the works in full production a fortnight after the fire.

STILL LIVING

DRIVER OF FIRST CAR

In view of the publication of the draft of the Road Traffic Bill, widen raises the motor speed-limit from -- to 40 miles an hour, it is interesting to recall that the inventor of the fir.‘ motor-car, the late Mr. John Henry Knight, a well-known Farnham, S ur ' rey, landowner, was fined 2s 6a ancosts at Farnham Petty Sessions October, 1895, for driving the car locomotive \ythout a red flag in Constates an English paper of last mon •• Mr. G. Parfitt, also of is still living, was actually the first drive the car. or “motor-carriage, it was described, Mr. Knight being . the time incapacitated, strang *• enough, by a carriage accident. Mr. Parfitt was accompanied by ' James Pullinger, an employee of. • Knight. Mr. Pullinger, who di< ea * January, was prosecuted at the s F n time as the inventor, and was nn similar amount. It was gravely s that the vehicle attained a speed miles an hour.

COMPULSORY INSURANCE

“On the subject of compulsory hi . ance we are of a perfectly °P en J?,t it states the “Morris Owner.” motorists are to be compelled y to cover themselves, there seems little excuse for not extending compulsion to all road users, vs. not excepted. Frequently an ac - is caused by the fault of a drtV 118 . horse vehicle of some financianj' sound tradesman, when the reco.. jjity, damages is a matter of impos and incidents are much more i than they are in the case i motorist who usually has a ntii behind him, or alternatively is - insured.” . ass°* The Pennsylvania Automotive ciation announces that only vo ted bers out of a total of 1,006 ha o t>iie “yes” favouring compulsory ia tioß insurance. Every loyal a voted “no.”

Motor drivers do have their die s ments in Java. A Dutch East delegate at the Third Worl . d Congress at New York stated a 9 the? only do the natives go to L ha t Jarun along the highways, fa c3 jt van cows charge headlong without provocation.