Investigations As City Re-Builds After £2M. Inferno

Connacht Tribune - August 20th 1971

Introduction

The giant reconstruction and repair work is now in full swing on a six acre city block of warehouses, shops and offices which was almost razed by the biggest fire in Galway's history on Monday afternoon last.

After the six hour inferno the whole rear of the block was a blackened, smouldering mass of burnt out wood, twisted girders and cracked masonry with close on £2m. worth of damage done to 26 premises.

Now a top-level investigation is going into what caused the fire and how another equally disastrous one can be avoided.

Monday's big blaze could lead to stricter regulations no fire prevention regulations that would prevent certain types of roofs and buildings and keep timber yards away from the city centre.

So far no clue whatever has been found as to the cause of the fire and because of the tremendous heat any clues may have been obliterated. However, there is general satisfaction that it was accidental.

Standards

The investigation is being led by Galway Fire Chief Captain Brendan Sugrue who said yesterday that there was a need for better standards of fire safety in buildings.

Said Capt. Sugrue: "Fire damage to this country has been jumping. What we have got to do is make sure that we are planning for safer buildings. We are putting up huge blocks, completely undivided inside. We will have to plan for safer buildings".

Other questions that will have to be answered by the investigation is that on many people's lips about the adequacy of fire-fighting provisions in the city and the complete failure of water pressure at one stage.

He told our reporter: "We had plenty of water. We had eight men initially and this rose to twenty within minutes and later to one hundred. The facilities for fighting the fire were adequate but there is a limit to what the human can do."

"That limit was reached here very quickly and it took three quarters of an hour to mobilise brigades from other areas."

A Limit

"We had plenty of water, but there is a limit to what human nature can do. It just is not possible to provide enough water for that type of fire. Tests carried out in Finland show that it is impossible to put out a fire in stacked timber", he added.

Concluded Captain Sugrue: "Here we were aware of the risk of fire for many years".

Asked why something was not done about it, Captain Sugrue said their powers were limited in these matters and they could not do anything.

The slow, painful process of piecing together how the huge fire started is now going on. It now seems certain that a number of people saw the fire at about the same time before noon - some put it as early as 11.30.

One of these Miss Anne Marie Vaughan, an employee of the Western Regional Tourism Organisation and third year medical student, said yesterday that the fire was first brought to her notice by another member of the staff Mrs. Maureen Bailey

Ran Along

Said Miss Vaughan: "Immediately in front of the window there was a wisp of smoke. Very suddenly flames appeared on timber near the top of the wall. The flames just ran along the wood within seconds."

Simultaneously a number of other people - from the head waiter of the Great Southern Hotel to a member of the Corporation - reported the outbreak.

It now appears certain that at some stage in the early battle against the outbreak there was a complete loss of pressure in the mains, which were probably over taxed by the huge consumption of water.

Said Mr. Thomas McDonagh, Managing Director of Messrs. Thomas McDonagh and Sons Ltd., in whose premises the fire began: "The firemen seemed to have the blaze contained in one section of our premises but the hoses went limp and you can't fight a fire without water".

£2M. Race

From there the fire got into the Belfast-type roof - wooden struts covered with felt - and began its £2m. race through the rear of the block.

Blaze Engulfs Galway Block

Once the big blaze got out of control in McDonaghs timber yards and stores at Merchant's Road, there was no stopping it. It spread into the timber and felt roof and was soon racing along through a hundred yards of the premises.

The fire siren was sounded at almost exactly noon and by 12.30 the McDonaghs premises were a mass of searing hot flames topped by a pillar of black smoke mushrooming hundreds of feet into the air - the sad portent was seen as far away as Shannon.

Then the light breeze seemed to pick up and suddenly the real danger of the fire became apparent as the flames licked the back walls of the National Bank at the corner of Eyre Square and Merchant's Road.

Quickly the building was hosed down while important documents, filing cabinets and other important items were removed, other documents locked in the fireproof safe and the staff evacuated.

Now the blaze was a raging inferno reaching thousands of degrees and whole buildings at the back of McDonaghs literally exploded from the heat. The fire then reached Corbetts timber yards.

This was what the firemen had been dreading. The flames raced through the yards, Corbetts ultra-modern, multi-storey walk around store and offices and broke out on to the city's main thoroughfare at Williamsgate Street.

At 1.10 Corbetts frontage was a blazing mass with buildings at the rear and sides catching fire. Fallers' on the far side of the main street caught fire from the tremendous heat but this was quickly put out.

Doomed

With the flames still raging, Blackrock Tailoring Company in flames at the rear and fire threatening the backs of the other premises on the main streets, the whole centre city block looked doomed.

But by now 100 firemen from 16 brigades from Galway, Mayo, Athlone town were fighting the blaze, pouring millions of gallons of water on it.

Superhuman efforts by them and by volunteer workers who hosed down the roofs and ceilings of threatened buildings finally stopped the fire from spreading.

By six o'clock the greatest fire in the history of this city was all but beaten. For twenty four hours it continued to blaze and smoulder, but by then the work of getting back to something like normal life had commenced once more.

Hundreds of voluntary workers who had carried files, valuables and furniture from offices, private houses, an hotel and other premises began moving them back in. Corporation workmen began cleaning shattered window glass off the pavements while over-taxed Gardai and Army kept traffic moving.

Total Cost

Total cost of the fire was: Eight buildings badly damaged or gutted; eighteen others ranging from an engineer's office to hotel, damaged to varying degrees; about £2m worth of damage done in all.