CAR & TRAIN COLLIDE

Greymouth Evening Star, 17 June 1930, Page 5

CAR & TRAIN COLLIDE

SIX PEOPLE KILLED TRAGEDY AT SOCKBURN [PER PEESS ASSOCIATION.] CHRISTCHURCH, June IG. Four nurses, the driver of a motor car, and an engine driver, were all killed almost instantaneously when, at 5.23 o’clock this evening, the 5.10 p.m. workers’ train from Islington smashed into a five seater Government motor-car at the Sockburn level crossing. The effect of the impact was that the engine, with six of the wagons, was derailed. The dead are as follow: —

Matron Isabella Duncan Brand, aged about 40 years; Matron at Templeton Farm Colony Branch of the Sunnyside Mental Hospital. Nurse Mary Cameron. Nurse Jane Field Palmer. ■

Nurse Isabel Dorothy Hensell. The nurses belonged to the Farm Colony. Three were single, and were in their early twenties. Ralph Augustus Smith, aged 20; single; motor-car driver; employed by the Sunnyside Mental Hospital. Charles Waterloo Smith,. aged 59 years; married; engine driver, emplayed by the New Zealand Government Railways. The fireman on the train was Frank Carson of 82 Olliver’s Road, Christchurch. Ho was thrown clear of the engine. He was taken immediately to the hospital, suffering from scalds and shock.

The fem’ nurses, who had been spending a day’s leave in Christchurch, were returning with the driver in a five-seater open Austin car. Evidently Ralph Smith, who was travelling at about 20 miles an hour, saw the crossing-keeper’s lamp . too late, for he swerved to the left in a last attempt to avoid the engine. The car, however, was caught in the middle, and it was carried to the cattle stop, where it became caught in the wooden beams. There the car gave a sufficient resistance to lift the engine right off the rails and caused it to telescope; six or seven of the wagons, plunging the whole into a piled mass of wreckage across the rails and on the embankment. About 20 yards further on, the engine buried itself in the ground, with a hiss of escaping steam. In five minutes the leading wagons were aflame. The four nurses and the driver were thrown out of the car on the far side of the crossing, where all of them were badly mutilated. They all died within two minutes.

The engine driver was pinned under the locomotive and killed. Piled up 20 feet into the air, the wreckage of the telescoped sheep trucks and wagons, under which the car was shapelessly held, caught fire rapidly, and showed the horror and tragedy of the accident. The engine, which was travelling with the tender first, was almost completely turned about, facing the way that it came. The wreckage of wood and iron bulged out over the far set of rails. Underneath was the car, twisted and torn and ripped, until it was hardly recognisable.

The city firemen worked feverishly under Superintendent Warner’s direction to recover the engine driver’s body. At length water was obtained from the abattoir, and with this, 'the first was thoroughly extinguished. Sections of the car, steering wheel, seats and pieces of its equipment were strewn down the whole length of the track with the bodies over and among them. Such was the tangle and confusion, that it was impossible to. separate truck from truck. The whole lay in one heaped mass to the right of th'e engine and behind it.

ARDUOUS SALVAGE WORK.

A MISTAKEN SIGNAL.

CHRISTCHURCH, June 17.

The scene of the accident presented a terrible sight. Firemen were mounted on the burning wreckage endeavouring to suppress the flames sufficiently to allow the many willing workers offering to rescue the body of Driver Smith buried beneath. The crowds, which had gathered by this time, pressed in on them with morbid attraction, until finally a hose was turned in the air in their direction to disperse them. When the police arrived more order was kept. Six sheep trucks immediately behind the engine were telescoped and piled upon the top of the engine. The car wreckage caught alight from the fire of the engine and blazed fiercely. The woodwork of the trucks spread the flames.

The bodies were quickly removed from the smouldering heap, being laid out on stretchers, on the fax - side of the line. In the darkness it was almost impossible to distinguish the trucks and the half buried engine jumbled together in an unrecognisable heap. The tender had been wrenched at an angle of almost 45 degrees from the engine itself, while the cab had dug itself into a small embankment to a depth of about five feet, with the driver caught between the boiler and the side of the cab. In its uncontrollable career, the train had charged through the fence and knocked over an outhouse at the rear of the crossing-keeper’s hut. The wreckage of the motor could be seen enmeshed in the wheels of the big engine. Several personal articles of the passengers remained in it, including a quantity of women’s clothing. At 12.30 p.m the body of the driver was recovered from the wrecked cab in a crushed condition, and taken to the morgue. One explanation of the tragedy is that a minute or two prior to the arrival of the train, which struck the car, a train from Christchurch bound for Ashburton passed over the crossing. It is possible that the driver of the car saw the crossing-keeper’s signal, but mistook the green light for the signal that the line was clear, the Ashburton train having just passed over.

CORONER’S COMMENT. CHRISTCHURCH, June 17. “It is a dreadful disaster that has overtaken us,” said Coroner E. D. Mosley, at the inquest opened this morning, and adjourned on the victims of the crossing smash. “I am sure the public of New Zea-

land sincerely regret that it should have happened at all. It is hard to understand. Here are six lives of value to the community gone in a moment.” Evidence of identification was then given.

MINISTER’S SYMPATHY. WELLINGTON, June 17. The Minister of Railway (Mr Veitch) to-day addressed a conference to consider ways and means of reducing traffic accidents. On behalf of the Government, he expressed condolence with the relatives of the Christchurch smash victims. Ho would not like it thought that the level crossing was the only source, or even the principal source of danger. He believed that unorganised and uncontrolled traffic on 1 the main roads was the principal cause of accidents. Level crossings were by no means the chief danger or consideration. Every one of the dangers must bo carefully and seriously considered, and weighed Tn the balance, in deciding how to minimise accidents. MEAT FOR WEST COAST. A van-load of meat consigned to the West Coast, for Westport and Greymouth was also destroyed by the fire, which followed the overturning of the engine, the meat-van being next to the latter. In all 80 carcases were lost. SAFETY-FIRST CONFERENCE. WELLINGTON, June 17. A conference called by the Government to consider the best methods to reduce the number of traffic accidents opened to-day. Representatives of local bodies and the Railway Department were present.

Mr Veitch, in the absence of Mr Taverner, opening, said the Conference was an indication that the Government was seriously impressed with the need of meeting the very comprehensive new conditions that had arisen as the result of the introduction of the motor car and the internal combustion road motor vehicle. They were up against an appalling situation, and were losing about one life a day He believed that the number of accidents could be reduced as the result of the deliberations of the conference. Mr J. S. Hunter, Commissioner of Transport, is presiding over the conference.

FARMERS’ UNION REQUEST. WELLINGTON, Juno 16. A permit from the Auckland branch, before the Dominion Executive of the Farmers’ Union, proposed that owing to the increasing number of level crossing, fatalities, the Railway Department be urged to expedite the adoption at all level crossings of most up-to-date methods of preventing, as far as possible, the recurrence of similar accidents. Mr. O. P. Lynch (Manawatu), said that on a previous occasion he had suggested that the Department should arrange to put up prominent warnings on the line, a quarter of a mile from either sido of the crossing, and it should be an offence for any driver to approach the crossing without whistling. The Department put up plenty of notices warning the general public, but should put up more notices warning its own men. Mr. W. Morrison (Wanganui) drew attention to what the Highways Board and Public Works Department had done. They were getting together and had requested County Councils to supply lists of crossings in their county, and the order of danger.. The motion was carried unanimously * LATER.

The number of motor accidents occurring almost daily was brought forward in a motion that the Union consider steps should be taken to educate motorists as to what are principal rules of the road, and that some of the most important rules be inserted in the drivers’ licenses. Mr B. Dalrymple said the rules must, be reasonable. It was decided to make representations to the Automobile Associations, on the lines suggested.

NEGLIGENCE PROVED WELLINGTON, June 16. A claim for damages arising out of a collision between two motor cars on October 2, 1929, was heard in the Magistrate’s Court before Mr. E. Page S M. ’George McLean, builder, who was represented by Mr. W. E. Leicester, claimed from Percival Charles Stratford* (represented by Mr. H. Lawson, Featherston) £173/6/6 for repairs to his car, and £B5 for depreciation, making a total of £258/6/6. It was! set out in the statement of claim that the defendant was proceeding from Clyde Quay to Kent Terrace, "when he collided with plaintiff’s car, wbwh was driven by Archibald Louden McLean, with the. consent of the plaintiff. It was contended by plaintiff that the defendant had failed to keep a propel lookout, and had failed to observe a mechanical “red” or stop signal. After hearing the evidence, Mr. Page said that the defendant did not deny negligence, but he urged that there was contributory negligence on the part of the plaintiff. In his (Mr. Page’s) opinion, negligence on the part of plaintiff’s driver had not been established, and plaintiff must succeed in his claim for damages. Judgment was given for the plaintiff for £20.,/ 6/6, and costs amounting to £l6/12/-.