Frightful Railway Disasters.

Auckland Star, Volume XI, Issue 3220, 15 November 1880, Page 3

Frightful Railway Disasters.

GREAT LOSS OF LIFE.

A frightful railway accident occurred at Pittaburg on the night of October 9th. The Walls accommodation train having come into collision with n special train from Greenburg. Both trains were tilled ■with passengers, especially the Walls, which contained several marching clubs, •which participated in the liemocratic demonstration here to-night. Some of the paasenger3 were so badly scalded that the flesh peeled off their bones. Even at the slow speed at which the train was run the shock was terrific. Both engiues and several cars were badly wrecked. A mistake in signals caused tha calamity. Nine passengers were killed instantly and many were injured, some fatally. On the day following the accident tuc deaths numbered 20. The following is a description of the collision :—The first section stopped at the regular station, Twenty-eighth-street, wheie thtjv were delayed on account of another train which was in the next block. The second section came along at trood speed, but owing to crowds on the back platform of the first section, signal lights were hidden from view, and consequently the engineer of the second section did not see the train ahead of him until he was so near it that the train could not be checked in time to avert a collision, and the engine ■went crashing into the rear coach of the first section, packed as it was with hrnnan beings. Aruong these unfortunates the engine buried itself to the very car windows in among screaming, suffering men, women and children, manglingall who were in its course. The boiler-head of the colliding engine was burst off by the shock, and scalding water and steam poured over the occupants of the car, as if bent on completing the terrible work that had cone before. It i 3 impossible to describe the fearful scene that followed. The moans of the dying and wounded, aod the Bhrieks of those who had lost their friends were frightful. Word was immediately telephoned to the Mayor's office for assistance, and twenty-five policemen, with a full corps of physicians and wagons, were dispatched at once to the scene of the disaster, where they were soon busily employed in alleviating the sufferings of the victims and clearing the wreck. The wounded who were tinable to care for themselves were carried to the Soldier's Hospital, located but a short distapco from the scene of the accident. The engineer and Greman escaped injury.notwithstandingthatthey stuck to the engine when it ploughed through the rear car of the other train. A sickening list of the dead and injured is given. There were 24 deaths, including several women, and nineteen injured persons were removed to the hospital. Robert Pitcairn, Superintendent of the road, one of the best in the country, said if the rules had not been disobeyed the accident would not have occurred. The train had not not yet gone into the block operated by the signal system, and the flagman wa3 under imperative orders to go back half a mile to flag the following train ; he must not wait to be ordered back by the conductor, but should go of his own accord. This applies whether the train is in the block or still in the yard limits. In this case the flagman and all employe's of the train are old and experienced men, and officials cannot condemn them until an investigation is had, but the matter will be sifted and tho responsibility placed were it belongs. The passengers state that the flagman, whose name is Penrod, did notjgoj back. Orders' for the movement of trains were the same as have been in vogue for thirty years, and officials insist T.hat the trainmen, and not the superior officers, violated the rules.