TERRIBLE EXPLOSION.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXVI, Issue 9326, 1 April 1889, Page 5

TERRIBLE EXPLOSION.

AN HOTEL WRECKED.

FIFTY PERSONS KILLED. An appalling catastrophe occurred at an early hour on Monday, February 18, at the Park Central Hotel, Hartford, Connecticut, a large brick building five storeys high, with a frontage of 30 feet and a depth of 100 feet. A large boiler in the basement exploded about five o'clock with a terrific report. The hotel fell in ruins, whilst the front of another hotel opposite was blown in at several points, and the windows of all the neighbouring houses were shattered. Scarcely had the building fallen than the debris caught fire. The hotel contained a good many guests, most of them persons connected with the theatrical profession, and commercial travellers. The ruins had to bo flooded with water before the work of rescue could be attempted. Within the first hour or so some few dead and dying who lay near the edge of the debris were brought away, but it was not until nine o'clock that the rescuers were able to begin their work in earnest. Unhappily by this time the flames and the smoke had placed many beyond the reach of human aid. Some had perished before the eyes of the horrorstricken crowd. One man, with his wifo and little .was plainly seen in the midst of the debris, pinned down by some of the wreckage. No help could reach them, and they perished. A young woman also was seen struggling to extricate herself from under some hea-y timbers, and uttering shrieks which filled all hearers with an agony of pity; but nothing could bo done to help her. When the rescuers at last made their way into the ruins they found that many of the dead had perished in the same way as the poor people just alluded to, having fallen beneath woodwork which was weighed down by bricks and masonry. The night clerk of the hotel was among those killed, anil the hotel books disappeared. It is conjectured that there were SO inmates in the main portion of the hotel whichfellin.andof those about2oare believed to have escaped at the time of the disaster. Several persons who were thought to be dead were extricated alive, and they, together with six injured, previously found, were taken to the hospitals. The engineer who had charge of the boiler at the Park Central Hotel was subsequently arrested on a charge of manslaughter.