PETROLEUM NEWS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 283, 27 May 1912, Page 8

PETROLEUM NEWS.

TARANAKI OIL FIELDS CO. Messrs. C. Carter and H. Okey, M.P., members of the advisory board pf the | Taranaki Oilfields Company, who went ;to Wellington last week to confer with Sir Geo. Clifford, a member of the board | of directors of the company, returned on Saturday evening. Speaking to a News' representative, Mr. Carter expressed himself as very pleased with the [results of the conference. Everything Ito facilitate the development of the industry will be done. There will be no halting, no waiting—the directors mean to go "full steam ahead." The fact of the refinery and drilling machinery being on order and leaving London with a fully qualified staff in June has favorably impressed all the shareholders he came in contact with whilst away, and it will also have the effect of helping the formation of other prospecting companies, who will not be linn'icapped as the pioneer company l\*i« b (( >n in the 'matter of treating the o ;i when won. Generally speaking, a. iri-t optimistic feeling exists in Wellington in regard to the future of the Taranaki oil field. Mr. H. J. Brown, of the British Oil Trust, who is at present in the south, w :, l return to New Plymouth on Wednesday evening.

THE BONITHON COMPANY,

Mr. Wm. McLean, of Wellington, secretary of the Bonithon Freehold Oil Company, who was to have left for America by the Tahiti on Friday, for the purpose of securing an up-to-date plant for boring on the Bonithon property at Moturoa, has postponed his departure for a month, pending the acceptance of a tender for the new theatre to be erected in Manners street by the ■Wellington Opera House Company, of i which he is secretary.

TERRIFIC GAS EXPLOSION. Mr. Rorrenson, who owns the properly on the Smart road on which considerable prospecting w ,%s done for kaolin or pottery clay, had occasion la?t week to clear one of the tunnels which had been driven, but which had choked. He had not proceeded far when there was a terrific explosion of the accumulated eases, which fortunately did no harm. Thef ollowing morning, on returning to the site, he discovered distinct indications of petroleum.