VICTIMS OF FLOOD

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 16 March 1928, Page 5

VICTIMS OF FLOOD

SANTA CLARA DISASTER.

DEATH ROLL NOW 300. CONSTRUCTION OF THE DAM. BY CABLE—PRESS A BSOCIATION —COPYRIGH'I WASHINGTON, March 14. ■ An unofficial list, of the dead as the result of thn bursting of the St. Francis reservoir is now 300. An official list cannot be compiled for several days. There is a danger of disease breaking out among the rescue workers and homeless, ancl relief stations are being established where they can be inoculated against typhoid. Most of the bodies, it is believed, are buried under the sand near Santa Paula., where those found are badly mutilated. Damage to the extent of five million dollars has boen done to orchards. The top soil has been carried away and a blanket of .sand left in its -place.

State architects and engineer® say that the dam. was not based on solid rock, but that one end- was fastened to shale and the other to conglomerate formation. Water is said to have penetrated the soil on either .side and weakened the .structure. Both sicleis gave way and the centre portion remains standing. The dam was known as the gravity type, being-arched upstream. It was built of .solid concrete and was 259 feet high and 160 feet wide at stream level.

SEARCHERS AT SANTA PAULA

BURIED CARS LOCATED

Received 9.55 a.m. to-day. NEW YORK, March 15

A message from Santa Paula -states: Search for the victims of tlje flood continues. With dynamite and tractors, the worker.- are slowly cutting their way through the piles of debris. The first victim to be found all vie since Tuesday was an unconscious child, which was discovered in the limbs of a citrus tree on a ranch. Search is now centred at a point where the river widened and the flood .spent itself. Eleven bodies, were found huddled in a basin badly mutilated. It is believed that more will he found here under tons of clay and sand Fourteen automobiles from the camp oi the Southern California Edison Company were located, and a steam shovel had' to be used to discover whether the a contained bodies. The re-establishment, of communication is progressing rapidly, .'likewise efforts to reduce the risk of disease Manv hundrpds of missing will bo found,'though the number missing.lias lessened with the .return of Mexican families who fled to the hi He.