HOLOCAUST OF FIRE

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 745, 19 August 1929, Page 13

HOLOCAUST OF FIRE

EXPLOSION IN RUBBER

FACTORY MANY GIRLS KILLED Disaster occurred on a recent morning at Pressburg, on the Danube, a few miles from Vienna but in Czechoslovakia. In Pressburg, now generally called Bratislava, is the largest rubber manufactory in the country. Only women and girls are employed. It appears that a short circuit spark ignited petrol fumes. The resulting explosion was heard all over the town. Some 30 girls were working in the room where the disaster occurred. Eight are known to have been killed instantly. Several others liad their limbs torn off by the force of the explosion, and all were burned beyond recognition. One young girl seems to have sought safety under a boiler which, however, hurst. Only her skeleton was discovered. Some of the girls managed to flee from the room, but their hair and clothes were on fire, and it is feared that many will not recover. How many bodies are buried under the ruins of the factory is not yet known. It took hours for firemen to quell the flames, and hours elapsed before a proper search could be made. First aid services were hampered by the fact that all the telephone wires round the factory were fused. Messengers had to run on foot to alarm the fire brigade and the police. As the news of the explosion spread, mothers and other relatives of tbe ! girls rushed to the scene, and almost tore off each other’s clothes in their despair and in their auxiety to ascertain what had happened. Finally, tbe garrison received the ; alarm. Soldiers were drawn round the fated building to keep tbe crowd at a distance, for it was feared" that more | explosions might take place. Brigade men fought the flames, and succoured as many as it was still posi sible to save, and at last the fire was ■ got under. The fetory was a picture iof destruction. Seven drying boilers had been shattered, and a large benzine tank lay flattened out on the ground, while powerful iron girders were bent or broken like matches. Firemen risked their lives, as soon as they could approach the ruins, to search for any women who might be found still aliv?. But there had been very little chance 1 of anyone living in such a flerv fnrj nace. j All the windows in the neighbouri hood were smashed.