RAILWAY SMASHES

Hokitika Guardian, 23 March 1931, Page 5

RAILWAY SMASHES

MORE PARTICULARS. £United Press Association —By Electric Telegraph—Copyright.] PARKS, March 20. Many passengers by the Paris-Bor-deaux express perceived an ill omen in the death from heart failure aboard the train just prior to the accident of a fellow passenger, Madame Colin. The train tore on for half a mile before the driver and majority of the passengers realised the accident owing to the. bumping on the InJlast ot the third car which was derailed. Eight bodies* were recovered and forty were injured. Others are believed to be missing. The dining car waiters cry “lie down,” probably saved maiiv" lives. The most difficult task was the extrication of five persons jammed in the telescoped concertina passage between the diner and adjoining carriage. An English boy aged eleven stoically endured two* hours agony while workmen cut away the hampering steelwork with acetylene torches. ' Michadi who was on his .honeynoon was found dead amongst the smashed crockery. His bride was seriously injured, An English victim, Frank Hatcher Westman, was a middle-aged man whose inseparable companion, his brother Walter was unhurt, t WAGGONS WRECKS HUTS. • PATHS', March 21. Heavily laden goods wagons from coal mines at Pirmlny became defcneh. 1 ed, during the night from a train, and ran down a grade, ' The brakesman jumped off when the wagons were pass, ing through a station. He was seriously injured. The runaway wagons, gathering momentum, dashed into a. siding, jump- 1 ing the metals, and then crashed into huts, where railways’ families were sleeping, injuring women and children, when they stopped. The guard was found in debris crushed to death. He had remained at his post in an effort to check the headlong rush. BORDEAUX EXPRESS SMASH. LONDON, March 21. In the Bordeaux express smash, Madam Colin died in a compartment occupied by M. Colomb, a member of tile French Chamber of Deputies, who, with other passengers, sought a place elsewhere. He was standing on a platform between carriages with an official who was about to throw a note off at Etaples station regarding the disposal of Madam Colin’s body when the collision happened, fatally hurling the officials through a half-open door, and burying M. Colomb in a mass of wreckage. • "