ALL CLEAR.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 275, 20 November 1931, Page 8

ALL CLEAR.

MAIN TRUNK BLOCKAGE.

N OHMAL RUNNHf G RESUMED

DAMAGE ESTIMATED AT [£2000.

CFrom Our Own Correspondent.)

TE EXJITI, Thursday.

The Main Trunk line, which was blocked-last nlgM owing to the derailment of a goods train at Kiokio, near Otorohanga, was-clear.for normal traffic this morning.

, Tite train which was derailed had a crew. of' three, driver, fireman, and guard- A farmer ; living close to the scene of the accident said he was awakened 1 by the most terriffic crash, he had ever heard, and thought it was an earthquake : visitation. A scene of wholesale devastation was presented close'to the Kiokio railway station. Coal and potatoes were strewn

about, intermingled with, broken pieces of woodwork and tangled and twisted portions of truck buffers. Several trucks were found bottom up shot over a bank into a creek 15ft below, adjacent to which was a 16-ton truck full of coal, and apparently quite undamaged, resting quietly among the willows in the stream below.

The truck which left the track jumped the rail on the high, side of a curve about a mile north of Kiokio station. Thie was plainly traceable by the heavy 'indentures made for the whole of that distance on the sleepers and limestone ballast. The weight of the train in the rear, together with the action of the brakes, evidently kept the other trucks and wagons on the track as the train proceeded on the down grade to Kiokio station. When approaching the railway yard, the driver noticed something eerious was wrong, and evidently applied the emergency brakes, with the result that the heavy 17 wagons behind telescoped the 15 vehicles in front, wrenching the buffers and couplings and throwing the wreckage in all directions.

A feox truck laden with potatoes struck a telegraph post in its headlong flight to the creek, where 15ft below 180 bags of potatoes were extracted from a heterogenous mass of copper wire and coal and loose potatoes from the broken bags. Four of the wooden trucks are a total wreck. The balance of 11, most of which are iron coal trucks, are only partially damaged. The damage is roughly estimated at about £2000.

The emergency workers speak" "in appreciation of. the cheerful assistance rendered by Mrs. F. D. S. Anthony, the wife of a surfaceman at Kiokio, who throughout the night supplied them with hot tea and food. She also provided all-with breakfast.