HOLIDAY DISASTER

New Zealand Times, Volume LIII, Issue 12431, 27 April 1926, Page 7

HOLIDAY DISASTER

TRAIN SMASHS MOTOR-VAN NINE KILLED NEAR MELBOURNE MANY OTHERS INJURED' Bv Telegraph.—Press Assn.—Copyright. (Received April 27, C. 25 a.xn.) MELBOURNE, April 26. The holiday was marred by a disastrous accident on the Ferntree Gully line, when to-night an electric railway train dashed into a large motor-van which was crowded with picnickers. Details of the accident are meagre, but so far as it is known nine people were killed and 15 or 16 were injured, several seriously. It is feared that when the work of extricating the victims from the wreckage is completed the death-roll will be larger. The collision occurred at a level crossing at Boronia, about six o’clock. The van was smashed to splinters, and its human freight was scattered and mangled by the on-rushing train. The nine bodies sent to Melbourne did not reach the city, and their identity

will not be known till a very late hour. Later The accident, was the most disastrous one of the series of level-cross-ing smashes in the history of Australian railways. Fern Tree Gully is a great rendezvous of picnickers, and, to-day being Labour Day, many motor-van and other parties visited it. The scene of the disaster is two miles on the Melbourne side of Fern Tree Gully station, from which the train started. It had time to get up a good rate of speed, and struck the motor-van with tremendous force, and heeled it over. It then cut through i* and its living freight, dragging the debris a considerable distance before it could be brought to a standstill. Mangled bodies and wounded were pinned among the. debris, moaning and screaming, mixed in an inextricable mass, and the work of extricating them was difficult. Those who escaped death or injury were so shaken and unnerved by their terrible experience and the heart-rending scenes around them that they were unable to render much help. With the assistance of holidaymaking parties, and people living in the ' vicinity, the work ' proceeded slowly. The wounded were removed from among the wreckage, given medical aid as soon as possible, and sent on to Melbourne, where the dead also were sent. It was late before this work was completed, and at the time of cabling the identity of the victims was not available. The wrecked van carried 24 passengers, including women and children.