SWEPT BY TORRENT

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 21296, 24 September 1932, Page 3 (Supplement)

SWEPT BY TORRENT

STRANGE FLOOD TRAGEDY PEOPLE TRAPPED IN TUNNEL A terrific* downpour of rain on the mountains behind Nice just before midnight a few weeks ago caused one of the strangest flood tragedies in the history of the Riviera. In but a few minutes the bed of the River Paillon, usually almost dry at that time of the year, was swept by a torrent which rose to a height of more than 6ft. The Paillon runs beneath the city, through a wide concrete tunnel half a mile long, which is used as a shelter by homeless folk, who at the moment are unusually numerous. 'They were trapped in their slumber by the flood waters, and some—it is not yet known how manywere swept out to sea and drowned. In the afternoon, after a search, about a dozen appeared to be missing. The alarm was raised when screams were heard during the height of the storm, and the firemen of Nice worked heroically through the night tp reach possible survivors. They waded waist-deep into the torrent and threw ropes to struggling men and women. One woman was holding desperately' to a concrete pillar, against which she was forced flat by the. force of the current. The firemen threw a rope to her and she made a desperate leap to grasp it, but was carried,-awav before the eyes of 1000 helpless onlookers. In the darkness beneath Barla Bridge, further up the river, searchlights revealed struggling groups of three and four people. None of them reached the lifebuoys which firemen threw to them. Other rescuers, held securely bv ropes tied round their waists, went into the torrent- up to their hips and saved four men, none of whom could give any clear account of what had happened.