Due to the political composition of the County Borough of West Ham, there was much social housing spread throughout the borough. One particular housing estate was located in a backwater of the borough where the council appeared to house some of it’s more difficult tenants. The entire estate comprised of blocks of tenement style buildings. Each block being four floors high and each floor accessed by a double flight of stairs with a sharp 180° bend midway leading to a small landing on the next floor above.
As a young fireman I was advised by more experienced and wizened colleagues that if I ever attended an incident at this housing estate, I was never to ask questions no matter what I might find.
I once attended a chimney fire at this estate in the 1960’s. At this time central heating was still something of a rarity. It was always possible to tell one reached the location of a chimney fire as the smell of burnt soot permeated everywhere. Sometimes in the dark, the offending chimney appeared like an erupting volcano with a multitude of sparks gushing from the top. Extinguishing a chimney fire is normally a simple if somewhat messy task, providing one has the correct equipment. The equipment itself is pretty basic but very effective and consists of a series of flexible bamboo canes which can be screwed end on end. A rose nozzle is attached to the top cane which has numerous small holes around it allowing fine jets of water to emerged from all around the globe shaped nozzle. This has the advantage of requiring very little water to extinguish the chimney fire while at the same time minimising water damage. The nozzle is connected to a thin flexible hose which is in turn attached to a stirrup pump that can be stood in a bucket of water.
As one firefighter manipulates the canes up the chimney, his colleague will slowly pump water. Normally it requires less than half a bucket of water to extinguish a chimney fire provided no unforeseen difficulties are encountered.
At this particular incident, the flat, (apartment), was located on the top floor. In a way we were thankful as this meant the chimney flue would be short in height and much easier to deal with. It was my task to go to the bathroom and fill the bucket with water from the bath tap. As I pushed the bathroom door open, the door opened no more than about 6 inches before it suddenly slammed shut in my face. I apologised profusely assuming I had interrupted someone using the bathroom but was greeted only with silence. I knocked on the door asking if I could come in only to be followed by more silence. More cautiously I once again slowly pushed the door open and like before, after a few inches it again suddenly slammed shut.
Filed under: Amusing, Donkey in the bathroom | Tagged: apartment, chimney, chimney fire, donkey, fire service, fireboot, firefighter, fireman, scantily clad, tenement | 1 Comment »
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