Quote Originally Posted by touringcarfan View Post
It would be unlikely that the Birkenhead appliance would have responded from their own station but more likely have been on a cover move to Takapuna. That is still a fair travel down to Devonport and would certainly have allowed ANY fire to increase in size.
Donkeys years ago when I took my Fireman's badge in senior scouts at a fire station (a great course by the way; I learned and remembered a lot) as I understood it then, there was a system by which the nearest station would indeed cover the next along the system, by sending an appliance over as soon as an appliance was despatched. Obviously, somewhere along the chain, they might be a bit light, but they were very well organised.

Fortunately, we are just around the corner from the Birkenhead station, but I still dread to think what could happen in a timber framed house.