Evening star., 1924-08-03
FIRE ALARMS keep
MANY MEN BUSY
Citizens May Get Excited
But Headquarters Must
Always Remain Cool.
Send the engines quick; my house
iS or

|
Before the operator at fire alarm
headquarters. trained to keep cool in
emergencies, could ask for the ad-
dress, the excited householder had
dropped the telephone.
Somewhere in Washington there
been in Georgetown or in the out
| skirts of Anacostia. In less than so
seconds the man at headquarters
could have had engines rumbling
through the quiet streets il he had
any idea Of where to send, them.
! But he is trained to deal with emer-
gencies. Perhaps If he waited
| another frantic call would come. but
, ne wastes no time waiting. Flashing
| the receiver hook, he gets the central
| toned to emergencies. One Of her
| instructions is to be watchful of fire
calls and when the man at headquar-
| ters explains the situation she is able
| to trace the origin Of the call nine
| times out of ten.
| This does not occur often in the
hre alarm office, but occasionally a
| man or woman Will become SO ex-
cited at the discovery of a fire in the
| nome that he or she will give an in
complete or incoherent message to
| the operator.
| To be awakened at night by the
crackle of flames leapins up the
| stairway is sufficient to excite even
4 IL.
| say the men at headquarters, remem-
| Der when you reach for the telephone
| that next TO the word fire" the ad-
| dress of your home is the most i'm
| portant thing to be shouted in the
| operators ear. He will know from
| to your home and in less than a
minute your neighborhood firemen
| Will be out of their beds and speed
! ing to your assistance.
Mechanism Of Alarms.
! In this enlightened day there are
probably few city dwcllers who do
not know how to sound an alarm
from street box. But the average
! citizen has little conception of the
; intricate and delicate mechanism
that Is set in motion when he breaks
| the glass, opens the door and pulls
| down the magic hook.
! Pause for a moment at the door
, OF that queer-looking room on the
| hfth floor Of the District Building in
which the hundreds of wires from
| fire alarm boxes all over the city
| terminate.
The walls are lined with black
panels on which are surmounted rows
Of glass cylinders. Each cylinder
! represents a circuit OF boxes and the
| numbers included in that circuit are
! cylinder is red electric bulb, and
| below that is a Ieter.
| At desk at one end of this room
you will see James G. Simpson, su-
! job for more than thirty years and
has seen the firm alarm system grow to
| its present state OF perfection.
In front Of the black panels on the
wall you will catch a glimpse Of
Lewis F. Mothersead, who has been
dispatching firemen to big fires and
little fires every day since 1887. Oc-
| casionally he turns to make entries
! in his log book. but his watchfuI eye
keeps glancing at the paneled wall.
Spreading the Alarm.
Out on the street a citizen has dis
covered fire. He runs to the corner
and pulls" box. One Of the red
bulbs that line the paneled wall Of
| headquarters flashes uD and a bell
| begins to strike the number.
| The operator reaches for the lever
| beneath the lighted bulb and throws
! 1t over. The first round Of the box
i number is heard only at headquar-
ters. but the throwing of the lever
/ flashes warning in every engine
house that an alarm is coming
The second round will strike in the
| houses. but the turning OF that lever
| has warned the men in advance and
by the time the second count starts
chusging. to 60
With the completion Of the second
| count the companies assigned to thai
| box are off. The others hold them
selves in readiness for possible ex-
But we have gotten away from
headquarters. After the operate,
there has thrown the lever which
| flashes the alarm to the engine houses
he turns to- another imposing piece
and resembling the inside Of a huge
alarm clock. He opens the case and
! sets the dial to strike the number
of the box that has just been pulled
This causes the big gongs in the en-
gine houses to repeat two more
rounds Of the number.
! Action Is Quick.
I workings Of the fire alarm system
you probably have conceived a notion
that considerable period Of time
| has been consumed. In reality, ac-
cording to supt Simpson. the eng ngines
! minute after the hook is pulled in the
| box. OF course, the smaller the mum.
Der on the box the fewer are the
| seconds lost in counting the strokes.
FIre shief M Watson so, estimates ,,7, that
quarters IN from 20 to 40 seconds
| The length of time consumed in run
ming to the box depends on the dis
tance and the condition Of traffic at
! the time the alarm is sounded
The excited citizen who pulled
the box and who sees the smoke
| curling from a nearby window may
feel in his anxiety that the engines
| Will never arrive, but within three
or. four minutes there will be at least
one company laundering down the
street
When two or three alarms strike
simultaneously from the same i'm
mediate neighborhood the operator
at headquarters must exercise dis
! cretion, for 1t usually means that
several persons have seen the same
! blaze and scurried to different boxes
| II two boxes are widely separated
in location, however, and they strike
together the operator will take no
| chances. He will dispatch them both
to the engine houses.
| More Alarms By Phone.
The telephone is more generally
used in cases Of fire than one would
expect. Although there are 500 fire
alarm boxes in Washington, there
| were 1,403 alarms received by tele-
phone during the past twelve months
as compared with 1885 box alarms
in the same period.
Firemen were called out during the
year on 1913 false alarms from boxe,
| and so false telephone calls. Supt
Simpson does not believe that all Of
| these 50 telephone messages were in.
tended to deliberately mislead tn.
department. In many instances it il
believed the persons calling saw
clouds Of smoke and telephoned Itc
headquarters before investigating t.
determine whether the smoke wa:
II you stand at the elbow Of the
fra alayun onerafor for an hour - o.