FIRE DEPARTMENT DOINGS

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FIRE DEPARTMENT DOINGS

NOTE—Special Fire Business News, with proposals, etc., will be found on page 267.——EDITOR.

In his inaugural address Mayor William H. Kimball of Rochester, N. H., recommended the purchase of more fire apparatus for the city.

Dunkirk, N. Y., is to hold an election to decide on the bond issue of $30,000 for the purpose of installing and equipping a modern fire alarm system.

A plan for installing a new fire alarm system has been considered by a fire committee of Chicopee, Mass. A system of either eight or twelve circuits is proposed.

The next convention, the forty-fifth, of the Iowa Firemen’s Association will be held at Boone, Iowa, on November 14 and 15, 1922. E. E. Parsons, of Marion, Iowa, is secretary.

A new fire alarm signal purchased for the Metuchen, N. J., department has been lost in transit and a tracer has been sent out from the local railroad station. A tower is to be erected on the Eagle Hook and Ladder Company’s house, surmounted the signal built upon a platform.

The public and parochial schools of Glen Cove, L. I., N. Y„ are to be equipped with fire alarm boxes under the direction of Chief Charles Miller of the Glen Cove fire department. Chief Miller is now trying to have fire boxes installed at street corners so as to give alarms direct to headquarters.

The floor of the fire house on Water Street, according to Commissioner of Public Safety Norman A. Boyd of Binghamton, N. Y., will have to be reconstructed in order to hold the apparatus which is being installed there. A concrete floor seven inches in thickness will probably be added.

In a report of the London fire brigade it is shown that the losses by fire during 1921 were 2,500,000 as compared with 1,941,555 in 1920. The brigade answered 6,740 alarms and the number of fires was 4,550. The loss of life amounted to approximately one hundred, many of these casualities occurring at small fires before the brigade was called.

A change in the designation of assistant chiefs of the Poughkeepsie, N. Y., fire department has been made and hereafter they will be known as deputy chiefs instead. The foremen of the various companies will be known as captains. The change in title was suggested to the fire apparatus committee of the board of aldermen by Chief Noll and was agreed upon.

Fires in the city of London, England, according to Dr. Waldo, the city coroner, have been on the increase. He stated that there had been 225 outbreaks of fire in the city during 1921, as compared with an annual average of 215 for the past twenty years. This does not appear a very large number compared with 327 alarms of fire in New York city over the New Year’s holiday. Dr. Waldo, speaking of the causes of the London fires, says: “I consider that from one-third to one-half of the fires are caused by lights thrown down by smokers.”

The city council of Marshall. Mo., has taken up the matter of purchasing a fire truck for the use of the city fire department. Representatives of various makes of trucks were before the council recently, explaining their makes of machines, and it was voted that the mayor and a special committee go into the matter thoroughly and report at a later meeting. It is the sense of the council to buy a pumper. The council has recently purchased 500 feet of hose and with the addition of a motor pumper, it is believed that the efficiency of the department can be raised considerably.

A fire prevention week was started in Pittsburgh, Pa., on January 23 under the auspices of the Pittsburgh Association of Credit Men, it being under the personal direction of the president of the association, A. D. Sallee. Several fire prevention films were shown throughout the week in all the motion picture theatres. A large meeting of city officials and business men was held on January 27, at which T. Alfred Fleming, supervisor of the conservation department of the National Board of Fire Underwriters, spoke on Credit Versus Waste. Mr. Fleming also delivered a ten-minute address at the Broad Casting Station of the Westinghouse Company, using the radio telephone, which is arranged to reach over 50,000 homes.

Considerable friction having developed as to whether the chemical car of the Suffield, Conn., fire department should answer alarms outside the fire district at a conference between Chief L. G. Allen and Assistant Chief Frank Smith of the fire department and the village fire-commission, a compromise was effected whereby the matter of the town of Suffield purchasing a chemical truck from the village is to be taken up and voted upon at the next annual meeting of the town of Suffield. At the same time the town will take up the matter of purchasing a lighter car, possibly a pumper. Both cars would then be used not only for fires in districts of Suffield and West Suffield but also will be sent to any fire within the town limits. The matter was left in abeyance until the annual town meeting.

Through the action of the city council of Tiffin, Ohio, the saving of approximately $5,000 a year will be effected through the reduction of the salaries of the employees of the safety and service departments by ten per cent. The matter was placed before the heads of the department by a committee of the council, which showed them that it was absolutely impossible to pay the present rate of wages. When Chief John A. Grogg placed the matter before the members of the fire department, they accepted the reduction without question. An ordinance was then passed by the council by which the changes of salary were fixed as follows: The salary of the chief under the ordinance is $135 a month, present salary $150: two captains, one electrician and two motor mechanics, $3.75 a day each, present salary $4.17; four firemen at engine house No. 1 and two at engine house No. 2, $3.60 a day, present salary $4; first year men, $3.40 a day for the first six months, present pay $3.80, and special firemen as needed, $3.40 a day, present pay $3.80. Firemen are given every fourth day off duty and 10 days’ annual vacation with pay.

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FIRE DEPARTMENT DOINGS

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FIRE DEPARTMENT DOINGS

NOTE—Special Fire Business News, with proposals, etc., will be found on page 228.—EDITOR.

The United States Government recently awarded a contract for 2,000 quart-sized Super Fyr-Fyter fire extinguishers, to be delivered to Mare Island Navy Yard, near San Francisco, Cal.

At a session of the Maine Forestry Association at the state house of Augusta, Me., on January 6 must stress was laid upon the necessity of better fire protection for the forests.

A new Stutz fire truck has been purchased by the city of Brookfield, Mo., has been delivered and is now in commission. The truck cost $12,800, and the city council of Brookfield feels that it will meet the needs of the city for several years to come.

Acting on the suggestion of the committee on losses, which has been considering the problem of a steadily increasing fire loss in the past year, the New York Board of Fire Underwriters appropriated $100,000 on January 25 for the purpose of investigating fires which are believed to be suspicious.

Five firemen of the Edgewater, N. J., fire department were slightly injured in fighting the fire on nine barges moored at the docks in that city. The blaze was a stubborn one due to high winds and smoke, but in spite of this fact the department confined the fire to the barges and saved several steamboats and tugs moored at the adjacent piers.

Baldwin, L. I., N. Y., now has four apparatus for its fire department and the volunteer department is free from debt, besides having a suitable sum in the treasury. They are now contemplating purchasing a site for a new fire hall for housing Company No. 3 and a new fire alarm system, and the members of the department have recently purchased new musical instruments.

Director of Public Safety Brennan of Newark, N. J., has issued an order limiting the speed of fire apparatus en route to fires to a speed of twenty-five miles per hour. The limit fixed for returning from fires is fifteen miles per hour. All street corners are to be turned at a speed of ten miles per hour or less.

The fire losses of Arkansas, according to statistics compiled by T. F. Baker, manager of the Arkansas fire prevention bureau, will probably run considerably ahead of 1920. The destruction of saw mills, cotton presses and cotton warehouses was responsible for the increase. No accurate report on the amount of the losses is available as yet, but according to Mr. Baker, newspaper reports show that the loss is heavy.

A suggestion by Mayor J. M. Wood was made to the common council of Elmira, N. Y., on January 16 that immediate steps to obtain legislation be taken whereby the construction of buildings within the city limits must have the approval of the fire commission. Corporation Counsel H. L. Gardner of the city has also urged the council to bring before the legislature this plan at once.

A series of three public lectures are being given on Trade and Commerce at the High School of Commerce, 65th Street, west of Broadway, in Manhattan Borough, New York City, on Friday evenings at 8:15 p. m. A lecture of special interest to those interested in Fire Prevention will be held on the evening of February 1 on Fire and Fire Prevention, bv Professor W. L. Estabrooke, of the College of the City of New York. This lecture will be illustrated by actual chemical experiments.

The annual election of officers of the Rhode Island State Firemen’s League was held on January 12, following the annual dinner at the headquarters of the Providence Veteran Firemen’s Association, Providence, R. I. William R. Comrie, East Providence, was elected president; Daniel F. McLaughlin, Riverside, secretary and treasurer, and commissioner of the Firemen’s Relief Fund, and Rev. R. H. Woffenden, chaplain. The league voted as a bodv to support Riverside firemen in their campaign to have the muster of the New England Firemen’s Association held at Crescent Park next August.

A fire in the United Shoe Shine and Shoe Repair Shop in Claremont, N. H., on January 7 was extinguished before it had done very much damage. There being a great many suspicious features in connection with it an investigation was made by the authorities and the proprietors of the shop were arrested on a charge of incendiarism. In the shoe shine parlor papers were found strewn on the floor saturated with inflammable blacking material and there was also an odor of kerosene. Two 2-gallon receptacles were also found, which had contained kerosene. The proprietors of the shop, who denied the charges, were held in $500 bail each.

In referring to the fire conditions in Gary, Ind., of which Wilfrid Grant is chief of the fire department, the National Board of Fire Underwriters’ committee on fire prevention and engineering standards says as follows: “In the principal mercantile district the predominating type of construction is joisted brick, with a considerable proportion in large areas, but heights are low, accessibility is good, streets are of fair to good width and the fire fighting facilities are adequate, and fires beyond the control of the fire department are improbable. In the minor mercantile and tenement district on either side of Broadway, between 9th and 18th avenues, large fires are probable, but the progress of such fires should be quickly controlled. Local fires only are probable in the large mills, which are isolated. The flying brand hazard due to wooden shingled roofs in residential sections, while present, is greatly reduced by the absence of close grouping and the generally adequate quantities of water available.”

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