Restoring Order In Wrecked Texas City

Northern Advocate, 19 April 1947, Page 7

Restoring Order In Wrecked Texas City

(Received 10.30 a.m.) NEW YORK, April 18. THOUSANDS of begrimed, weary workers are trying to restore order in devastated Texas City. Rescue parties, equipped with bulldozers, are turning over hundreds of tons of wreckage in their search for bodies believed to be still buried. From dawn men, women and children moved in long lines to depots to identify relatives killed in the explosions on Wednesday and Thursday.

While the fires are dying down the city is still a smouldering ruin, and the danger of new explosions has not yet passed. . _ Forty-six victims of the disaster have developed symptoms of gas gangrene, says a report from Galverston. Dr Pulaski, of Brooke General Hospital, San Antonio, said there should be no general alarm over the gangrene development, as all 46 victims were exposed to poisonous f.umes from the chlorine tanks. The Monsanto Chemical Company announced that 307 of its employees were still msising. Asbestos-suited volunteers today began to penetrate the still smoking ruins of the plant in search of victims. I.IVE PEOPLE FOUND ? Later the Coastguard, broadcasting from a mobile transmitter on the spot, said live people were being uncovered in the Monsanto ruins. Reporters were barred from the Monsanto area and were unable to confirm the Coastguard report. It seems impossible that anyone could have lived through the terrible explosions and fires of the past 48 hours. An Associated Press correspondent said that the officer in charge of rescue equipment had been on the scene since daylight and had not found any victims alive. The deputy collector of customs at Galveston testified before a Coastguard investigation today that the manifest of . the French freighter Grand Camp showed that the ship carried 16 cases of ammunition. ANOTHER SHIP SINKS Residents again fled from stricken Texas City last night. • The authorities ordered the evacuation of the lower city area as fresh fires In the oil refinery and shifting wind caused new threats to the town. The wind was swinging to the south, blowing heavy smoke across the city and threatening to spread the flames. Another ship, the 7176-ton freighter Wilson B. Keene, owned by the American Government, sank as a result of the explosions.

The freighter, which was loaded with wheat, was lying alongside the High Flyer, which blew up yesterday morning. There were seven minor explosions during the day as oil tanks collapsed. The damage is now estimated at over 125,000,000 dollars. THOUSANDS FLEE Most of Texas City’s 18,000 people who were capable of doing so fled last night, but by noon 6000 had returned. As the report spread that another blast was expected, a fresh exodus began tonight. ri ' w l J VK - Diners, cooks and waitresses fled from one restaurant leaving half-cook' ed or half-eaten meals. Ambulance crews were bringing in more dead from the dockyards when the evacuation was ordered. The latest victims, who included six children, were horribly burned and almost impossible to identify. Three hours before the evacuation order the deputy-mayor (Mr J. Hill) announced that only four fires were still burning and that they were all under control.

INQUIRY DEMANDED Senator Lee O’Daniel (Democrat — Texas) in Washington asked for a Senate investigation into the Texas City disaster. . He said that, although the tragedy could have been accidental, it followed the pattern of others preceding the entry of the United States into the war and attributable to Communist underground activity. “In view of the high tension in international affairs it is the Senate’s duty to conduct a complete investigation,”’ he said. A French Embassy spokesman announced that a French inquiry commission would be sent to Texas City to investigate the explosion in the French Line ship Grand Camp. NO EXPLOSIVES ON GRAND CAMP A wharf labourer whose gang was ordered off the Grand Camp when the fire in the ammonium nitrate became threatening, said: “Ammunition of some kind in No. 5 hatch blew up. The nitrates in No. 4 hatch were burning when we went on board, but the explosion came when the fire . hit the ammunition | hatch.” None of the crew was on board the Grand Camp when she blew up, according to Maurice le Brozec, of Le Havre, one of the six known survivors of the crew of 41. All six are in hospital at Galveston, Le Brozec denied reports that the Grand Camp was carrying a cargo of explosives. He said the ship’s hold contained only sisal, ammonium nitrate, cotton and peanuts. The captain was on the wharf making a telephone call when the fire started, he said. The mate ordered the ship to be abandoned at about 8.30 a.m. Except for the surviving members, the crew joined a stevedoring gang on j the wharf. ATTEMPT TO KILL FIRE j Three of the survivors went to a I near-by refreshment stand and three i others began walking to a friend’s j home. The explosion caused the refreshment stand to collapse, killing the owner, but the sailors scrambled free. All the survivors suffered bleeding ears, swollen hands and feet and severe cuts. All the men who remained on the wharf are presumed to have been killed. The shio’s carpenter said he saw a little smoke rising from the fertiliser when he opened the hatch at 8 a.m. He picked up an extinguisher and plaved it on the fire. When more smoke came from the hatch he closed it and turned on steam into the compartment. The fire kept burning until it worked up enough pressure to blow off the hatch cover, but by then the crew had left the ship. \