Evening star., 1940-11-20
London Force Puts Out BIuzes
As Fast as Nuzis Set Them

they always come back and use 1t Tor
q target to bomb some more.
There have been over 1000 fire
men killed on duty in London since
it began. Two thousand are a lot
Of firemen.
Mr.. Fordham explained to us
about the system that already has
been described by correspondents,
the dispersal of apparatus outside OF
fire stations, on street corners.
Going about London you see them
everywhere. The standard gear is
a small two-walled hose truck. At
tached to the rear of a car is
trailer. The car is sometimes
truck built for the purpose. with a
covered tonneau in which there are
seats for the firemen-lengthwise
as in patrol wagon-and a place
for tools and chemicals.
As often as not the car that pulls
the hose trailer is a Communicated
taXicab with the gear piled into the
rear seat where the passengers
ordinarily ride. Dispersal of per-
sonnel and equipment is the great
lesson of this WARRIOR everything
from civilian shelters, hospitals. fac
tories, planes and airpOrtS need fire
apparatus to put out bomb fires.
Good View From Roof.
Mr.. Fordham asked if We would
like to see the control room. said
We would He said.
1--WE have a good view from the
roof. Would you like to work around
from up there flrst?'
We went up to look around. There
were number of German planes in
the air and you could hear them
more clearly than in the street.
The spoilers on the roof corners
were alternately watching them ana
looking out over the surrounding
roof tops Everywhere over London
these watches are on duty every
night, all night. The barrage was
heavy and all around us were fash
ing guns and above us the flashes
of bursting shells Two or three
German planes together droned
across to us The searchlights tried
to find them. Mr.. Blackstone said:
They keep trying to hit us here"
After a while we went in and
took the elevator down to the con-
troll room.
Switchboard in Cellar.
1t was a very deep cellar. I don't
think any kind of a bomb could
have gotten to it. AS We walked
into the room on the left we saw the
wide sweep of 10 or 15-place tele-
phone switchboard, manned by fire.
men. They were sitting on stools
twisting idly from side to side.
There were no cords in the switch
board. Nothing was happening
Directly in front of us across the
middle of the room sitting in little
cubicles with their backs toward us
were half a dozen girls, telephone
equipment on their heads They
were all knitting. Mr.. Fordham
said:
When a call comes in the switch
board transfers it to one Of the girls.
who takes down the detail There
are no bells. The switchboard at
tracts their attention by flashing a
light
I thought of all those planes I
had heard flashing overhead. I felt
nervous. If there was a bomb fire
I wanted to 60 to it, but I knew I
would be frightened. We walked on
past the girls into the far half of the
room. And on two large walls were
enormous maps of London. The
most interesting looking was covered
with hundreds and hundreds of
thumb tacks with heads in different
shapes and colors Four or five alert
and intelligent young men stood
about or sat at tables in the center
of the room. We were all intro
duced. Mr.. Fordham said to one:
City Always Covered.
''This is your show wonder II
you wouldn't like to explain it?"
The man did.
He said: You see, this map shows
the disposition of every piece of
equipment in London and as the
fires come in the equipment moves.
All the other equipment in London