LYTHAM PIER FIRE
PAVILION REDUCED TO A SKELETON IN THREE HOURS.
EARLY-MORNING BLAZE : "LIKE A HUGE RED ORANGE."
CARETAKER'S TIMELY DISCOVERY AND ESCAPE.
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ALL that remains of Lytham Pier Pavilion, for over a quarter of a century a popular home
of the town's entertainments, is a mass of tangled steelwork. Fire which broke out early on Sunday
morning consumed greedily the wooden superstructure, leaving only a skeleton frame twisted
grotesquely as though by a giant hand.
Flames transformed the building into what one spectator of an awesome scene described as a "huge
red orange," from which a steady south-east wind carried sparks and blazing fragments over the
Green, creating the illusion of a vast flock of golden birds. The fire also bit downwards, eating
through the floors and depositing on the sands below a charred accumulation of debris.
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Serious as was the outbreak in its effects, it might have been
attended by loss of life, for Mr. John Evans, the attendant and caretaker, who
lived on the premises, had just left his sleeping quarters to give the alarm when
they were enveloped in flame.
The cause of the fire will never be known, though the most
popular assumption is that it originated from a dropped cigarette end. Whether this
as so or not, the consequences were terrible, for the damage, which is covered by
insurance, amounts to thousands of pounds. Official figures are not yet
available.
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PRESS CUTTING FROM JANUARY 1928
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In view of the forlorn state of the pavilion, there is cruel
irony in the notice, affixed to the entrance of the pier cinema: "One Minute to
Play." Then a few hours before the fire occurred, a large audience was laughing
delightedly at the manoeuvres of a comedy fire brigade in the picture "Hot
Stuff."
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