NINETEEN KILLED IN A POWDER EXFEOSION.

Auckland Star, Issue XXXVI, 21 October 1905, Page 13

NINETEEN KILLED IN A POWDER EXFEOSION.

SRASD PENNSYLVANIA, ETSTT&WUY MJatOLISHED. The Band powder mills at Falrchattce, Pennsylvania, were entirely wiped out by aa explosion on September 19. Of the 32 men who went to work in the mills nineteen are known, to be dead. Of these thirteen have been identified.

Besides nine of the factory force wtio were seriously injured, scores of people in the town of Fairchance, within half a mile of the powder miris, were more or less painfully injured.

The shock of the explosion was distinctly felt in Connellsville, twenty miles away, buildings being rocked on their foundations. At Jjniontown hundreds of panes of glass were broken. In the town of Fairchance there is scarcely a house that did not suffer damage. Haystacks w ere toppled over in the fields and live stock were stunned. The rails of the Baltimore and Ohio railroad and the Wesf Pennsylvania Traction Company were rooted from the roadbed and traffic was delayed six hours.

Train No. 52 on the Baltimore and Ohio had a narrow escape from annihilation. It had just passed the Rand. niiUs when the explosion occurred. The windows in the coaches were shattered and passengers thrown into a panic. A street car on the West Pennsylvania railway had also passed a few seconds before the explosion, and was far enough away to escape damage, but it was derailed.

There were s,even explosions in all. Every one of the ten buildings was totally demolished. The debris that was strewn over the ten acres of ground where the pant was ipcated took fire soon after the explosion, and added i*s terrors to the disaster. The first three explosions were not as serious as the last fon» Then the packing house, pressing roem and magazine blew up, followed by two cars of dynamite.

Many of the survivors had thrilling; experiences. Orrville Swaney was working in the glazing room and had gone out for a drink of water. He was just outside when the mixing mill went up. The explosion threw him high in the air, but he. landed on his feet in a net work of fallen wires. Dodging these, he sped around the hill, and was fifty feet away when the second explosion threw him on his face. He lay l here stunned, and knew nothing of the tenific blast that came when the storage magazine went up.

A half hour after the explosion he was picked up and carried to a place of safety.

All day at short intervals searchers would bring in bits of bodies or clothing. Some or these were carried in dish pans or damaged powder cans. A majority of the dead men were single, although several of them leave large families.

The hole where the magazine exploded Is fifteen feet deep and fifteen yarns square.

Conservative estimates place the loss io the Eaud Company at several hundred thousand dollars. There are also extensive losses to private houses and buildings in all surroundiug towns.

For a mile around Fairchance buildings were blown over, and at Uniontpwn. Pa., seven 8 miles from the explosion, hundreds of windows were broken. A large skylight in the courthouse at Uniontown was smashed, and there was a panic among the occupants to escape the building. Damage was done at Connellsviilc, Mount Fleasant and Scottdale, and in hundreds of homes the" dishes foil from the cupboards-and pictures were thrown from the walls. Scores of people in the town of Fairchance have painful injuries.