readersdigest.co.in 85Classic Drama In Real Lifesky. Shoppers in the car park ran for
their lives. Shielded by the tanker
from the full force of the blast, Marsh
shouted, “There’s a little girl trapped
under the trailer.”
“Let the firefighters handle it,”
a policeman replied. “Clear the area
now!” Truck, trailer and car were now
lost in a cauldron of fire. “That poor
little girl,” Marsh said,
holding his head in his
hands. “She didn’t have
a chance.”
With a blaze of
sirens, a pumper and
rescue trucks from
Manukau Station
arrived. Immediately
the vehicles stopped,
senior firefighter Royd
Kennedy had an arm-
ful of hose out of the
locker and his partner
was lugging foam containers down
behind him. Driver Tod Penberthy
was sprinting to connect the pump to
the nearest hydrant. Waiting for the
water, Royd saw his boots, fireproof
overtrousers and the rubber on his
breathing apparatus begin to singe.
When they turned the hose on the
fire, the heat was so intense that the
water steamed away before it reached
the flames.
Senior station officer John Hyland,
in charge of the initial response, had
never seen such potential for disaster
in 19 years of fighting fires.
The tanker was burning end to end,the front of the tanker to the burning
car. Flames were licking the trailer’s
tanks. Worse, fuel was leaking from re-
lief valves on the overturned trailer and
spewing from a hole in its front com-
partment. The whole rig could blow.
Marsh reached the car just as a
bystander hauled Gaylene out and
smothered her flaming clothes with his
own body. He and other
bystanders then carried
her a safe distance away.
A
bove the hiss of
escaping com-
pressed air and
the roaring fire, Marsh
heard a voice calling
“Mum! Mum!” At first he
couldn’t see anything.
Then, as he searched
underneath the toppled
trailer, he saw a young,
dark-haired girl trapped in a tiny
space between a rear wheel and the
chassis. “Mum!” she cried. “Mum!”
Marsh grabbed her beneath the arms.
“You’ll be all right. You’re coming with
me,” he said. But he couldn’t budge
her: Her lower body was pinned to
the ground by the wheel assembly.
“I want my mum!” she wailed.
A wall of fire ran the length of the
tanker, threatening to sweep around
under the trailer where Shirley lay.
Then, came a thunderous roar. An
explosion tore a hole in one of the
trailer’s four fuel compartments. An
immense fireball ballooned into the
A WALL OF FIRE
RAN THE LENGTH
OF THE TANKER
ALMOST AROUND
WHERE SHIRLEY
LAY. THEN CAME
A THUNDEROUS
ROAR.