RAILWAY ACCIDENTS.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume LXXI, Issue LXII, 13 May 1912, Page 8

RAILWAY ACCIDENTS.

A STONE IN THE POINTS. -S

BY TELEGKAPRV-PRESS ASSOCIATION. '. TNVERCA^GILL, May A Tailway accident of a rather serious -^nature occurrd .at the - Bluff last evening, when a passenger train from Invercargill collided with^a goods train waiting on a siding about 400 yards from the Bluff railway station. The accident occurred through some person^ as yet undiscovered, placing a stone in the points. The' passenger train, which left town at 5.10 p.m., was a fully-laden one, and had it not been for the automatic application of the Westinghouse brake a serious disaster might have occurred. As it was, the train ran on to the siding and collided; violently with a shunting engine, which was standing on the rails, connected with a long line of trucks. The second to last passenger car, however, jumped the points, severing the airbrake connection, and this automatically stopped the train.

The impact Was sufficient to throw the fireman, Harry Baxter, A riolently from the cab of the passenger train on to the tender, and he received several nasty injuries, including a broken nose. He was also, severely cut about the head. His condition to-night was, however, reported to be not very serious.

There will be an exhaustive enquiry into the circumstancs of the accident.