SLIP ON MIDLAND LINE

Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27036, 11 May 1953, Page 8

SLIP ON MIDLAND LINE

EXPRESSES DELAYED ON SATURDAY (From Our Own Reporter) GREYMOUTH May 10. Traffic on the Midland line was disorganised until a fairly late hour on Saturday evening through the slip which blocked the line and derailed an engine and four waggons of a goods train at Slovens creek, early on Friday evening. 1116 engine and waggons were not restored to the lines until about 9 p.m. on Saturday. The normal express train arrived at Greymouth on Saturday between two and three hours late and the arrivals of the Greymouth-Christchurch expreses were still later. The 9.5 a.m. Christchurch-Greymouth relief express was not run, the 240 passengers being taken to Arthur’s Pass by bus and from there to Greymouth by rail. The normal Saturday expresses left from Christchurch and Greymouth, each carrying about 250 passengers. At the derailment the passengers were transhipped. When the route was restored at 9 o’clock on Saturday evening, the accumulated goods traffic was permitted to proceed almost immediately. Gangs of workmen, with heavy machinery, which was being used in the Avoca area, worked throughout Saturday to clear the line.

The engine and four waggons of the goods train which were derailed, were almost completely buried by the slip. The West Coast district engineer of the Railways Department said there had apparently been a fairly large pocket of water above and when the train passed along that section it set the slip in motion, practically enveloping the engine. It was at first thought that the slip would be cleared in a comparatively short time, but the presence of water considerably delayed the repairs.