FLOODS IN U.S.

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22004, 30 January 1937, Page 13

FLOODS IN U.S.

Collapse of Buildings

Feared

STRICT CENSORSHIP OF

DEATH-ROLL FIGURES

(UNITEI) PRESS ASSOCIATION —COPYRIGHT.)

(Received January 29, 9.30 p.m.)

NEW YORK, January 23

A new crisis is developing in Louisville (Kentucky) where the Kaufman Straus Company’s department stores, a four-storey building, is reported to be nearly collapsing. Other larger buildings with the same foundations are also feared to be weakening.

Meteorologists say that the rains responsible for the flood were the greatest ever recorded in so short a time over such a large area. The average rainfall in the entire Ohio Valley, in 26 days was 16 inches. Johnsonville (Tennessee) had the highest recording, 23.11 inches, which was 2611 tons of water an acre. Louisville had the highest figure of the larger cities, 18.58 inches.

Mr Henry A. Wallace (Secretary for Agriculture) said the rains were so heavy that no flood control projects could have prevented the inundation

Officials in Louisville have tightened the censorship of news of the number of dead, and continue to insist that the fatalities are few. They have appointed Mr William Stoll co-ordinator, of information. All future statements for the press come from him.

Two Associated Press photographers discovered boats unloading cargoes of dead near a pontoon bridge where they took flash-bulb pictures. Police and soldiers drove them away and threatened to smash their cameras. There is no way of determining how many bodies the boats contained. One army official stated that 40 bodies were carried across the bridge during the day. The same photographers got pictures of one trench cemetery in the highlands containing 150 caskets. It is learned that fingerprints of many of the unidentified dead were taken in the hope of establishing their identity later. The crest of the flood is nearing Paducah (Kentucky), from which it is estimated that 15,000 have been evacuated. Eight hundred people are marooned in an hotel. Many are believed to be dead, but it is impossible to hunt for the bodies because of the rising river. An earlier message:—A relief corps numbering 130,000 concentrated on two fronts to-day in cleaning up the Ohio Valley and preparing for the expected rising of the Mississippi.

To-day’s estimate of the known dead is 235 The homeless are estimated at 1,000,000, and property damage is in excess of 400,000,000 dollars.