TRAIN DISASTER

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLVI, Issue 164, 12 June 1926, Page 9

TRAIN DISASTER

VIADUCT NOT THE CAUSE. STATEMENT BY OFFICIALS. DRIVER’S MIRACULOUS ESCAPE. (By Electric Telegraph.—Copyright.) SYDNEY, June 111 Tho reason for the derailment of the Brisbane express about 180 miles out of Sydney, resulting in a number being killed and injured, is not known. Officials later emphasised the fact that the accident was not caused through tho viaduct collapsing. The train had passed the wooden viaduct, which was about 400 feet from the steel bridge that spans the River Hunter, when it left the line and ploughed up the permanent way, seriously damaging the viaduct. A single line runs across the viaduct and the bridge, *and slopes down towards the rivei'j but the grade is slight and the line is straight. Tho driver of the leading engine, who had a miraculous escape from death, said that his engine would have fallen over, but the main engine pulled the draw-bar right out of his engine, and although it lost the tender, the whole of the pilot engine never left the road. He added that if the train had been composd of ordinary passenger cars there would have been hardly any survivors. As it was the special steel frame cars did not buckle, thus saving many lives. The Minister of Works and Railways states that apparently the derailment occurred before tho viaduct was reached.

The question of tho safety of wooden viaducts was raised in the Legislative Assembly in December last, when the Commissioner of Railways stated that he had adopted bridges of standard design, composed of brick, masonry, or concrete, with steel super-structure, and these bridges were replacing the wooden bridges as tho latter got out of repair. A report of tho disaster is being prepared for the Commissioner.— Press Association.