The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET. AUCKLAND TUESDAY, MARCH 5, 1929 SEARCHING INQUIRY NEEDED

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 604, 5 March 1929, Page 10

The Sun 42 WYNDHAM STREET. AUCKLAND TUESDAY, MARCH 5, 1929 SEARCHING INQUIRY NEEDED

THERE appears to be ample reason in the circumstances of the reservoir disaster on Mount Eden yesterday for a searching inquiry into the cause of the collapse and the important question of responsibility. Enough is known about the effects of the expensive accident to demonstrate very clearly that only an element of luck as to time mercifully spared Auckland the bitter experience of a tragic calamity. No person was hurt, such damage as was wrought is reparable easily at more or less cost, and there was a mighty loss of water. It is not necessary to imagine in detail what might have happened had the exposed wall of the service reservoir collapsed while forty men were at work in the palisaded basin of the new excavations for water storage extension, and when the daytime life of the residential locality in the traek of the torrential flood and avalanche vias at full activity.

Something more will have to he done about it than merely to repair the damage as quickly as possible and look upon the disaster as a picturesque thrill that caused no physical hurt to anybody. Already, it has been admitted officially that, last week,

“there was a small leak from the reservoir.” Because of that seeping evidence of strain on the reinforced wall from which a mass of buttressing earth had been necessarily removed to make way for the new extension in hand, instructions were given that the pressure of water within the old' reservoir should he reduced. These instructions were carried out promptly, and the contents of the reservoir were reduced almost by half—from 1,700,000 gallons to 800,000 gallons approximately. That was a substantial reduction, hut obviously it was not great enough to prevent a gaping hurst in the naked wall on the south-western side of the reservoir.

These official facts and the precautionary measure together prove conclusively that someone in a responsible position had been thinking seriously about the possible danger involved and the necessity of safeguarding human life and a- great deal of valuable property against destructive risks. Yet, in spite of that thought and at least one essential precaution, the disaster that was feared actually occurred, but fortunately without appalling consequences. Quite obviously the calculation of potential danger fell short of safe exactitude, while insufficient protection was provided against havoc.

It is beyond the province of laymen to determine causes, and it would be unfair even to discuss possibilities in a manner that might prejudice the interests of persons most deeply concerned, but it is the right of the public to demand that a menace to its interests should he investigated with thoroughness, if for no other reason than to secure an adequate guarantee that, so far as human care and precautionary effort can go, such a disastrous accident will not happen again, either at dawn when only a solitary milk vendor was abroad to see an awesome spectacle (citizens will sympathise with the astonished man’s excited efforts to make the police understand that something extraordinary had happened)', or at midday when the lives of hundreds of people would he jeopardised. So far, it has been stated authoritatively that “the cause of the break is something that cannot be determined until a detailed investigation has been made.” No one will want to dispute that simple reasoning, but its simplicity should harden the demand for an early and a complete investigation.

Auckland steadily expands, and with that residential expansion there increases the need of enlarging the service reservoirs. Tt so happens that the configuration of the metropolitan area lends itself to perching reservoirs on hillside, so as to secure gravitation pressure in the distribution of supply. This condition in itself is the best of all reasons for fixing the stability of elevated reservoirs beyond the risk of any collapse that could he attributable to weakness within human control.