CABLE NEWS. (BY ELECTRIC TELEGRAPH.—COPYRIGHT.]

Evening Post, Volume LXVIII, Issue 131, 30 November 1904, Page 5

CABLE NEWS. (BY ELECTRIC TELEGRAPH.—COPYRIGHT.]

THE EXPLOSION ON THE ORIZABA. «». „_ DETAILS OF THE ACCIDENT. A TERRIBLE SIGHT. COOLIES LITERALLY COOKED. [press association.! (Received November 30, 9.46 a.m.) FREMANTLE, This Day. The steamer Orizaba, on board of which an accident occurred, resulting in the death of a number of coolies, has arrived here. The accident happened at 7 o'clock on Friday morning. There was a terrible ru&h of steam, which enveloped the vessel. She gradually slackened speed and then stopped. The second engineer, who had just come on deck to make a .report to the chief officer, guessed what had happened, and rushed forward to the stokehold, from which volumes of steam were issuing. Atr,er about ten minutes, and before the steam had properly cleared, the engineer and white greisers descended into the stokehold, and there saw a terrible fright. A branch of the steampipe, eight inches in diameter, leading from tjie main pipe to the port forward boiler, had burst, and of the eight Indians employed in the vicinity not one escaped uninjured. The greasers proceeded to draw the fires and the engineers removed the injured to the deck. Four were dead and two, who were badly wounded, died the same day. Another one is seriously injured, and will be landed at Colombo, the eighth man being only slightly hurt. The men who were killed were literally cooked, and the hair on their bodies blown off. The steam pressure was 1601b at the time of the explosion. The second engineer had a narrow escape, as he examined the pipe two minutes before the explosion occurred, and then went on deck to report that the steam was escaping.