| Show MYSTERY FIRES by thomas F dougherty acting chief new york fire department as told to paul IV kearney in tho the Satur saturday dry evening post poet plainly spontaneous ignition la Is much more common than la is generally bel be llevad levoid and la Is an imminent possibility that may betray us from the moat unexpected quarter A wider knowledge of its causes and operation could not help but reduce its mettice demce so it behooves us to look into the problem ot of this and other of our mystery fires much more closely thau than wo we have in the past A few years ago the night shift in r job printing plant was disturbed by the tha odor of smoke at first the men ignored the danger signal os as people liiv li vAriably tri ably do thon they bount to explain it away neither of 0 these theae ex PO dic ants had ha d any effect on the tha smoke so they started an investigation which eventually led them to it a tobacco shop on the ground floor tho the source or of the trouble forcing an entry they examined the premises and discovered a stack of old news papers pa pers plied piled on the top of a row ot of shelves near the ceiling cel ling smoking furiously the incipient blazo blaze was waa quickly extinguished wd mid further investigation showed that not only were ware the papers steadily burning up from the cad out from the center of the pile but the combustion was also progressing down and had almost burned through the wooden shelf which was wag at least an inch thick it if that tire fire had come from an external extern sA source it would have been clearly indicated by traces of at char on art the top ot of the pile the outer edges of the papers or the underneath portion port loya ot of tho the shelf and it it had bad not been discovered tor for a few hours houra more the chances are that another outbreak would have been charged to that old standby stand by detective wiring or tossed into the great total of worth ot of donual destruction frankly fran itly classified aa origin unknown the e incident la Is significant enough in itself but its interest does not end here some time later a fire engineer was telling the story to a fire ire tion ion specialist who punctuated the conclusion of the anecdote with a re thump on hla his desk that ho he declared ac accounts coAts tor for the mysterious tire fire I 1 had in my own owl home a few months ago we had a S stack of old newspapers in the collar cellar that burst into flame one night and nearly resulted in a catastrophe that I 1 tremble to think of at last I 1 have the explanation ilow how many other times has it happened who knows the one thing we cru be certain ot of Is that millions ot of homes have those stacks ot of old papers piled up in their cellars those cellars are often damp and the ventilation poor the papers are thick with printers ink which contains ap bla block clr lampblack Is a prolific cause ot at spontaneous ignition and there I 1 you are I 1 not long ago a maid in an attract ivie suburban residence was busily engaged with liar her atterson atte after roon oon duties quite alone in the house during the temporary absence ot at the family detecting tile tho odor of smoke she beame alarmed and finally traced li it to the collar cellar in this case the cellar iva was immaculate the pride of EL a good booc housekeeper furthermore Further moie there was no tiro fire in the furnace no lights burning no gas or vapor present and am nobody hul heid been down thero there that day yet out in the middle of at tho the floor far removed from any possible louice of heat was a table on the top of it which w was one solitary object a neatly folded length of at burlap that only ri week before nad been taken oft off some plants in tho the yard that piece of burlap was ims belching clouds of pungent smoke and aad when the maid picked up one end an angry tongue of flame stabbed at liar her thus iv was s another mystery nip tho the bud there Is nothing mysterious about the iho tact fact that oily fabrics confined in a badly ventilated place pass through nn an oxidization pr ceas that thal raises the temperature and often results in ignition that li the story in a taw words cords spontaneous ignition is a chemical tact fact and chemi cra facts are not mysteries we make them mysteries very often because we tz take ke no pa pains ins to understand them and exert little effort to apply what we do understand painters rags heavens knows are notor notorious lous aitor their ability to start tires fires yet we have them constantly st one ot of them not long ago wrecked a house in the city of harrisburg han asburg the ignition at 0 paint cloths claths left around carelessly by workmen caiti causon sed damages of halt a million to a brand new public building mako make a resolve then that if IE Y you u ever have outsiders in to io refurbish your home you must never let those men got get away at the end ot of the day leaving their rags their paint pots and brushes even their overalls inside ot of your premises and it you you relf ever take a notion to add a modern touch ot of color to your kitchen or your furniture dont make the mis tako take 0 of thinking that a trifling fing quantity ot of oil on your old work clothes enough to be dangerous not only does doea this warning apply to those painters whose work rates as a craft it includes those who touch the more artia artistic tic heltha ot of water and oil colors oa more than one studio and museum can testify coloring materials contain oil or carbon and either of those substances on waste rags can start a tire fire just as easily whether it hoa has been wiped off a masterpiece or a kitchen chair monitor |
